Reading The Future: Philosopher's Stone
by yamhaars
Summary: Lily and Sev find seven mysterious books. Along with several classmates, Professors Dumbledore and McGonagall and a red-headed family, they have a chance to discover and change the future.
1. Prologue

**Yes, it's another reading the series story. I've read many of these and decided I had to give it ago and give it my own twist.**

**This is set in Lily and the Marauders 2****nd**** year at Hogwarts. The students are all twelve or thirteen. Molly and Arthur are in their early twenties.**

**I do not own Harry Potter and the words in bold will always belong to J. K. Rowling.**

* * *

><p>Lily Evans could not believe the cheek of that James Potter. To think he actually had the nerve to ask her out, and in front of the entire common room no less. Of course, she'd said no. But the Black boy had been guffawing away to himself the entire time, and soon the whole of Gryffindor was joining in. Whether they had been laughing at her or James she didn't know. Sure, he was the one who had been rejected, but she had been so taken back she'd stammered her reply and she just knew she had blushed bright red. What sort of moron would do something like that in front of the <em>whole common room<em>?

She was still angry by the time she met her best friend in the grounds. Everyone always asked her why she was best friends with a Slytherin, but Sev had been the one to first introduce her to the wizarding world, and she enjoyed his company, even if she did not appreciate his choice of friends. And she knew Sev's friends also wondered why he was friends with a Gryffindor and a muggle-born to boot.

He was waiting for her by the lake. She saw a few students glance curiously at them, noticing the mismatching scarves. Slytherin and Gryffindor together. Stupid prejudices.

"What's wrong?" he asked the moment he saw her.

"Nothing," she reassured him. She was not stupid enough to mention James Potter to him. What had begun as a few cross words on the Hogwarts Express last year was now a full-scale rivalry. She would have liked to say it was all James and his stupid friend's fault, but she knew Sev got the occasional comment in as well. Usually about the Black boy's family or the Lupin kid who always seemed to be ill and tired.

"I need to go to the library for this Charms essay if that's alright?" she asked. Sev nodded his agreement.

They walked to the library together chatting comfortably. It was times like this when she could almost pretend they were back home and there were no such things as Gryffindor and Slytherin.

Lily began searching for the book she needed when something caught her eye. A book with what looked like a Muggle cartoon on the front. It was of a boy and a train that looked like the Hogwarts Express. But what would the Hogwarts Express be doing on the cover of a Muggle book? The title was covered up with a piece of paper. As she tried to lift it up, words appeared on it out of nowhere.

_Hello Lily,_

_You and Severus, along with several others, need to read these books in order to try and change your future. There are seven books in total, you need to take all seven up to the seventh floor. There is a room there known as the Room of Requirement, to enter it walk in front of the tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy__ teaching trolls ballet three times thinking about how you need a place in which to read these books. The others will join you soon and I will contact you again once they have._

_Until then, goodbye._

_Sincerely, a friend from the future._

_P.S Please do not tell anyone other than Severus about this or you will lose your chance to change the future._

Lily read the message several times over, trying to make sense of it.

"S.. Sev," she called anxiously. "Come over here, look at this."

Curious, her friend did as she asked. As he read the note, his eyes narrowed in suspicion.

"This seems dubious," he said slowly.

"I know," she agreed. "But what harm can come of us following the instructions for now? We can at least see if this 'Room of Requirement' exists."

Almost unwillingly, Severus followed her up to the seventh floor, with the books levitated in front of her. She followed the instructions carefully and a door appeared opposite the tapestry. When she walked in, she found the room was empty. There was, however, two comfy chairs and a coffee table, upon which she directed the books to land.

"Why are all the titles covered?" Severus asked, examining each book suspiciously. He found each title and blurb was covered, though each had a picture of a child that looked suspiciously like James Potter. He couldn't suppress the feeling this was some prank James and his idiotic friends were playing on him, and was annoyed that they had felt the need to drag Lily into it too. For Lily seemed to genuinely believe what the note said, or at least she appeared to want to.

Two sofas, a crib, and a collection of baby toys appeared as five more people entered the room. Two of them were instantly recognizable to the two students, Professors McGonagall and Dumbledore.

"I have to admit, Professor, I still don't understand why we are," a red-headed man said to Professor Dumbledore. By the man's side was a heavily pregnant woman, carrying a toddler. Both had hair the same flaming colour as the man.

Dumbledore simply smiled. "The note simply said to gather together Minerva and your family and to head to this room. And what a magnificent room it is. I must say I have never been here before."

"Never?" the woman said anxiously, tightening her hold on the toddler.

"I would never dare to assume I know all of Hogwarts secrets, Miss. Prewett," Dumbledore replied. "Mrs. Weasley, even," he corrected with a smile in her husband's directions.

"Evans, Snape, you don't by any chance happen to know why we are here?" Professor McGonagall asked.

Lily was about to answer when the door opened once more. Five more people entered the room. Both Lily and Severus suppressed a groan as they saw James Potter leading the group.

He stopped at the sight of the strange group in front of him.

"What's the hold up, Potter?" Sirius asked, impatient.

"What's going on?" called a different voice.

"Perhaps if we could all come inside the room, Miss. Evans would like to explain," Dumbledore announced. "I assume you all got letters telling you to come here?" All five students nodded. "Well, let's sit," he called, with an exuberant arm movement towards the chairs and table.

The room now had seven armchairs, surrounding an ever growing coffee table. The two sofas were at each end of the table, with three armchairs on one side and four on the other.

"Perhaps, some introductions are in order," Dumbledore said once everyone was seated. "I am Albus Percival-"

"I think we all know who you are, Albus," McGonagall cut him off with an exasperated sigh. She was sat beside him one of the sofas. "And since I teach, or taught," she added with a nod towards the other two adults in the room, "you all, you should know who I am." She looked towards Remus on the armchair beside her.

"Remus Lupin."

"James Potter."

"Sirius Black."

All eyes turned to the ginger family, sat together on the sofa adjacent to the Professors, though all the purebloods in the room had an idea who they were.

"Arthur Weasley, and this is my wife, Molly, and our son, Bill." The toddler was sat on his father's lap (since there wasn't room on his mother's due to her expanding belly) and for now was happily amused with the toys provided by the room.

"Frank Longbottom."

"Alice Perks."

"Severus Snape." James and Sirius glared at him. McGonagall noticed and knew this was going to end in trouble.

"Lily Evans. And I found these books in the library with a note saying that, and I know this sounds strange, we had to read them to try and change the future."

Everyone turned to stare at her incredulously, expect Severus, who now just wanted this – whatever this was – over with. He did not like the idea of spending so much time around Gryffindors. Lily was alright – more than alright – of course, but he knew the others would quickly annoy him.

As Lily finished speaking there was a small flash of light and another note floated down onto the table. Dumbledore picked it up and read it out loud.

_Dear all,_

_I'm glad you all made it here. Even though it may seem strange to some of you, there is a reason for every single one of you being here today. There are some things you should bear in mind as you read:_

_Above all, reserve all judgement until you have finished reading all the books. Not everything is as it seems._

_But also, never forget that, due to you being here now, things can be changed. Please do not grieve too much for the events of the future, for with your help they may never happen._

_You are now unable to leave this room. Food, beds, etc. will be provided. The room is currently in a time-capsule, you will spend several weeks here but only mere minutes will pass in the outside world._

_You can now reveal the title and blurb of the first book._

_Yours sincerely, your friend from the future._

"So we're stuck here?" Severus asked unbelievably.

"It would appear so, Mr. Snape," Dumbledore replied cheerfully. Severus did not appreciate the old codger's merry attitude. There didn't seem much to be cheerful about. He was stuck in a room with James Potter for 'several weeks.' Then he remembered he was stuck with Lily too, which cheered him up instantly.

James and Sirius were happy to go with the flow – after all, it wasn't everyday someone from the future locked you in a room and told you to read a book. They certainly hoped the book was interesting though.

Remus was worried about when the moon waned in two days times, would the time-capsule prevent it from affecting him? He would have to ask Professor Dumbledore, but how to do so without attracting the attention of his new friends? He still struggled to believe people like James and Sirius were friends with him – he didn't want to lose that. Not yet. Of course, it was inevitable he would do some day when they discovered his secret, but he wanted to try and make that last for as long as possible.

"Try not to go into labour in the next few weeks," Arthur whispered jokingly in his wife's ear. This earned him a fierce glare. Molly was worried – what did a book from the future have to do with them? Did it involve one of her children? She glanced at Bill, playing contently in his father's arms, and then stroked her protruding stomach lovingly. What if something had happened to one of her children?

Alice and Frank were both wondering why they were here. After all, what could a book from the future have to do with them, the Weasley family, some kids from the year below and their professors? It didn't really add up.

Dumbledore, as always, was curious. So much he might be able to learn from these books. Contrary to popular belief, he didn't know everything, far from it. Could the knowledge gained from these books help with the war that was beginning to brew around them?

McGonagall was more worried about the potential for trouble between the three 2nd year male Gryffindors and the one lone Slytherin. Though she had to admit the books had caught her attention too.

"Shall we discover the book's title then?" Lily asked the group in general and everyone nodded in agreement. She picked up the first book – the one she had first noticed with the Hogwarts Express on it - and removed the paper covering the title. She almost groaned when she saw it.

"What is it, Evans?" the Potter boy asked her excitedly.

Knowing she had no choice, Lily told him. "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone."

"Potter?" all three marauders echoed.

"Any relations named Harry?" Sirius asked. James shook his head.

"It could be a future relation," Remus reminded them.

"Hey, James, it could be your son!" Sirius said with a laugh.

"My son?" he repeated back incredulously. That was a ridiculous idea. He was twelve years old for crying out loud. Sirius laughed more at the look on his face.

"Just great," Severus muttered to himself.

"What was that, Snivellus?" James challenged.

Before Severus could reply, McGonagall cut across him. "Since it appears we will be stuck here from some time, can we please try to refrain ourselves from in-fighting," she said sternly. She knew it wasn't going to work, but she had to try. "And if you could all hand your wands over," she added as an afterthought. There was much grumbling at this, but all the current Hogwarts students did as they were told.

Molly and Arthur looked at each other – were they suppose to hand their wands over too?

McGonagall noticed their predicament and smiled. "Since you are no longer students here and are sufficiently over-age you may keep yours."

Both of the adults smiled. Even though it had been four years since they left Hogwarts, and they were married with a kid and another on the way, being back at the castle made them feel like they were back in school.

"Maybe you should read the blurb, Evans," McGonagall suggested.

**Harry Potter thinks he is an ordinary boy – until he is rescued by a beetle-eyed giant of a man**,

"Hagrid," everyone said.

**enrols at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardly, learns to play Quidditch**

"Definitely a Potter," said James smugly, having recently got onto the Gryffindor Quidditch team.

**and does battle in a deadly duel. The reason: HARRY POTTER IS A WIZARD!**

"Well, duh!" Sirius said.

"This is going to be a long couple of weeks," Lily murmured to Severus as she put the book down on the table.

* * *

><p><strong>I'd love to hear any thoughts on the Prologue :)<strong>


	2. The Boy Who Lived

Everyone was staring at book expectedly, as though waiting for it to read itself.

"Can I read first?" Lily asked. Everyone nodded their consent and she picked up the book once more.

**CHAPTER ONE.**

**THE BOY WHO LIVED.**

"Whose that?" James asked.

"Maybe it's your son, Jamesie," Sirius replied, sticking his tongue out at his friend.

"Who lived?" Lily repeated, questioningly. "Whoever it is, it makes him sound like he survived something big." Everyone, even James and Sirius, looked thoughtful at her words.

"Like what though?" Remus asked.

"Perhaps we should read and find out, Mr. Lupin," Dumbledore suggested. Remus blushed a little bit. He had great respect for the headmaster, but he still found him a little intimidating.

**Mr. and Mrs. Dursley, of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much.**

"You're welcome," James and Sirius said together with identical grins.

"Are you going to do that every sentence?" Lily asked snootily.

"I'll shut up if you agree to go out with me," James replied instantly. The four Gryffindors who had been in the common room earlier that day (and how long ago that seemed) laughed at the reminder of his disastrous attempt to ask her out earlier. Severus meanwhile glared at him, before reminding himself that Lily hated Potter as much as he did. She would never go out with him.

Lily glared at him furiously. "No," she said sternly.

"Tough luck, Jamesie!" Sirius sang.

"Please continue to read, Evans," McGonagall said tiredly.

**They were the last people you'd expect to be involved in anything strange or mysterious, because they just didn't hold with such nonsense.**

"Nonsense? What nonsense?" James asked. "Where's the fun in life without a bit of mystery?"

**Mr. Dursley was the director of a firm called Grunnings, which made drills.**

"Drills?" Arthur asked enthuasiastically. Molly sighed – she knew he would be like this every time a Muggle contraception was mentioned. Of course, she'd known about his Muggle obsession when she married him, but she'd underestimated how annoying it would be at times. At least he kept it out in his shed most of the time.

"Muggle machinery used to put holes into things," Lily explained.

"Why would-" Arthur began.

"Not now, Arthur," Molly said sternly and Arthur nodded meekly.

"Talk about whipped," James whispered to his friends who tried their best to hide their snorts of laughter. Lily, thinking they were laughing at the idea of drills, glared at them again. She was proud of her Muggle heritage.

**He was a big, beefy man with hardly any neck, although he did have a very large moustache.**

"Sounds charming," Molly muttered sarcastically. Arthur laughed.

**Mrs. Dursley was thin and blonde and had nearly twice the usual amount of neck, which came in very useful as she spent so much of her time craning over garden fences, spying on the neighbours. The Dursleys had a small son called Dudley and in their opinion there was no finer boy anywhere.**

**The Dursleys had everything they wanted, but they also had a secret, and their greatest fear was that somebody would discover it. They didn't think they could bear it if anyone found out about the Potters.**

"What's wrong with Potters?" James shouted indignantly.

**Mrs. Potter was Mrs. Dursley's sister, **

"Charming in-laws you have here, James," Sirius teased. James was going to reply but couldn't. After all, he knew nobody in his family had any relations called 'Dursley' so these horrible sounding people could be his in-laws. He hoped his future wife wasn't like this as well. He wanted someone beautiful and fiery. Someone like Lily.

**but they hadn't met for several years; in fact, Mrs. Dursley pretended she didn't have a sister, **

"How could anyone pretend not to be related to their own sister?" Molly asked, disgusted. She was incredibly close with her two younger brothers, Fabian and Gideon.

Lily was thinking of her own sister – ever since last September Petunia had been increasingly cold to her and it tore Lily apart as the two of them had been so close growing up together.

**because her sister and her good-for-nothing husband **

"Definitely sounds like you, James," Remus commented, surprised by his own daring. Luckily, James just laughed. Remus relaxed, it still surprised him to have friends he could mess around with him.

**were as unDursleyish as it was possible to be. **

"UnDursleyish?" Sirius laughed. "That's not even a word. And who wants to be like these people?"

"Nobody," Sirius, Remus, Frank and Alice all replied.

**The Dursleys shuddered to think what the neighbours would say if the Potters arrived in the street. The Dursleys knew that the Potters had a small son, too, but they had never even seen him. This boy was another good reason for keeping the Potters away; they didn't want Dudley mixing with a child like that.**

"Hey! What's wrong with my son?" James shouted. All the children smirked at him, while the adults watched on, amused. "I mean, my possible son. I mean, man, this is confusing." It was weird to think about having a son. He did want to have children when he grew up, but it wasn't something he particularly thought about right now.

**When Mr. and Mrs. Dursley woke up on the dull, grey Tuesday our story starts, there was nothing about the cloudy sky outside to suggest that strange and mysterious things would soon be happening all over the country. Mr. Dursley hummed as he picked out his most boring tie for work,**

"He intentionally picked out a boring tie?" Alice asked incredulously. "What a boring man!" There were nods all around the room.

**and Mrs. Dursley gossiped away happily as she wrestled a screaming Dudley into his high chair.**

**None of them noticed a large, tawny owl flutter past the window.**

"An owl?" Arthur asked. "They're usually more careful than that."

**At half past eight, Mr. Dursley picked up his briefcase, pecked Mrs. Dursley on the cheek, and tried to kiss Dudley good-bye but missed, because Dudley was now having a tantrum and throwing his cereal at the walls. "Little tyke," chortled Mr. Dursley as he left the house.**

"Little tyke?" Molly repeated incredulously. She remembered when Bill had done that – she had not been impressed to say the least.

**He got into his car and backed out of number four's drive.**

**It was on the corner of the street that he noticed the first sign of something peculiar - a cat reading a map. For a second, Mr. Dursley didn't realize what he had seen - then he jerked his head around to look again. There was a tabby cat standing on the corner of Privet Drive, but there wasn't a map in sight.**

McGonagall wondered if that was her – she was the only cat Animagus registered in Britain. But what would she be doing there?

**What could he have been thinking of. It must have been a trick of the light. **

Arthur smiled to himself. The things Muggle would do to ignore magic, bless them.

**Mr. Dursley blinked and stared at the cat. It stared back.**

Dumbledore chuckled to himself. He had also wondered if this cat was his dear friend – that as much as confirmed it.

**As Mr. Dursley drove around the corner and up the road, he watched the cat in his mirror. It was now reading the sign that said Privet Drive - no, looking at the sign; cats couldn't read maps or signs. **

"Unless it's an Animagus," Frank said, remembering his transfiguration lesson two weeks ago. In fact, Professor McGonagall had changed into a cat right in front of his eyes. "You don't think it's you, do you, Professor?"

Alice gasped, also remembering their lesson on Animagus.

"I think it could be," McGonagall replied.

"But why would you be there, Professor?" Remus asked.

"I don't know, Lupin," McGonagall replied.

**Mr. Dursley gave himself a little shake and put the cat out of his mind. As he drove toward town he thought of nothing except a large order of drills he was hoping to get that day.**

**But on the edge of town, drills were driven out of his mind by something else. As he sat in the usual morning traffic jam, he couldn't help noticing that there seemed to be a lot of strangely dressed people about. People in cloaks.**

"That's not strange," Sirius said.

"It is for Muggles," Arthur explained.

"Really?" Sirius asked. His family had never told him anything about Muggles except that they were scum and should be avoided. Of course, he knew now that wasn't true – he had met plenty of Muggle-burns and they all seemed no different to him. Like Lily, for example. She wasn't his favourite person, but she certainly wasn't inhuman.

**Mr. Dursley couldn't bear people who dressed in funny clothes - the getups you saw on young people! He supposed this was some stupid new fashion. He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel and his eyes fell on a huddle of these weirdos standing quite close by. They were whispering excitedly together. Mr. Dursley was enraged to see that a couple of them weren't young at all; why, that man had to be older than he was, and wearing an emerald-green cloak! The nerve of him!**

"Horrible green cloaks," James muttered to his friends with a glance at his Head of House, who was currently wearing one. Why the head of Gryffindor insisted on wearing Slytherin colours he could never understand.

Severus scowled once more, sure the joke was about him, but not knowing what it was.

**But then it struck Mr. Dursley that this was probably some silly stunt - these people were obviously collecting for something...**

"Collecting?" everyone but Lily and the two Professors asked.

"For charity," Lily explained.

**yes, that would be it. The traffic moved on and a few minutes later, Mr. Dursley arrived in the Grunnings parking lot, his mind back on drills.**

"Wow, one track mind," Frank muttered to Alice – the only other person he really knew in the room. He knew the Gryffindors in the year below him by sight only. Except for James' stunt this morning.

**Mr. Dursley always sat with his back to the window in his office on the ninth floor. If he hadn't, he might have found it harder to concentrate on drills that morning. He didn't see the owls swooping past in broad daylight,**

"Something big must have happened," McGonagall deduced. Everyone else nodded.

"That's probably why we're reading this book, Professor," Sirius said cheekily, and bravely in Remus, Frank and Alice's opinion.

**though people down in the street did; they pointed and gazed open- mouthed as owl after owl sped overhead. Most of them had never seen an owl even at night time.**

"Really?" Sirius asked. "But how do they talk to one and other?"

"Fellytone," Arthur said proudly.

"A what?" Sirius asked.

"Um, do you mean telephone, Mr. Weasley?" Lily asked uncertainly.

"Oh, yes," he agreed, red-faced.

"So what is a fellytone?" Sirius asked again.

"Telephone," Lily snapped.

**Mr. Dursley, however, had a perfectly normal, owl-free morning. He yelled at five different people. He made several important telephone calls and shouted a bit more. **

"Such a lovely man," Remus muttered, earning him grins from his friends.

**He was in a very good mood until lunchtime, when he thought he'd stretch his legs and walk across the road to buy himself a bun from the bakery. He'd forgotten all about the people in cloaks until he passed a group of them next to the baker's. He eyed them angrily as he passed. He didn't know why, but they made him uneasy. This bunch were whispering excitedly, too, and he couldn't see a single collecting tin. It was on his way back past them, clutching a large doughnut in a bag, that he caught a few words of what they were saying.**

**"The Potters,**

"Why are people talking about us?"

"If you'd let me read, Potter, we'd find out," Lily replied through gritted teeth.

**that's right, that's what I heard yes, their son, Harry." **

"See it is your son," Sirius pointed out. James shrugged, he had pretty much accepted that now, despite how strange a concept it was. He was a only child – the only Potter that remained in the wizarding world aside from his parents. If this kid's name was Harry Potter and his parents were magical, then he was the only option for father. He wondered who the kid's mother was.

**Mr. Dursley stopped dead. Fear flooded him. He looked back at the whisperers as if he wanted to say something to them, but thought better of it.**

**He dashed back across the road, hurried up to his office, snapped at his secretary not to disturb him, seized his telephone, and had almost finished dialling his home number when he changed his mind.**

"What a coward," James spat. "He could be a Slytherin," he added with a smirk in Severus' direction.

"Shut it, Potter," Severus growled back.

"Make me," James replied, beside him Sirius grinned.

"Leave him alone," Lily said sharply.

"Maybe you should continue reading, Miss. Evans," Molly intervened just as McGonagall was about to. The latter witch was thankful for the formers maternal instinct.

**He put the receiver back down and stroked his moustache, thinking... no, he was being stupid. Potter wasn't such an unusual name. **

"It is in our world," James said.

"Well, obviously moustache face doesn't know that," Sirius replied. Remus, Frank and Alice snorted at the nickname. Lily would have but she didn't want to increase the Black boy's ego anymore than it already was. Not that he was as bad as Potter.

**He was sure there were lots of people called Potter who had a son called Harry. Come to think of it, he wasn't even sure his nephew was called Harry. He'd never even seen the boy. It might have been Harvey. Or Harold.**

"I am not calling my son Harold, Dursley," James said with disgust. Sirius and Remus smirked at him some more and James blushed.

**There was no point in worrying Mrs. Dursley; she always got so upset at any mention of her sister. He didn't blame her - if he'd had a sister like that... but all the same, those people in cloaks...**

**He found it a lot harder to concentrate on drills that afternoon and when he left the building at five o'clock, he was still so worried that he walked straight into someone just outside the door.**

**"Sorry," he grunted, as the tiny old man stumbled and almost fell. It was a few seconds before Mr. Dursley realized that the man was wearing a violet cloak. He didn't seem at all upset at being almost knocked to the ground. On the contrary, his face split into a wide smile and he said in a squeaky voice that made passers-by stare, "Don't be sorry, my dear sir, for nothing could upset me today! Rejoice, for You-Know-Who has gone at last!**

"WHAT?" all the students and the Weasleys shouted. Bill looked up in interest at the noise.

"He's gone?" McGonagall stammered a few seconds later.

"It appears so," Dumbledore said thoughtfully.

The Marauders cheered loudly. "Let's have a party!" Sirius cheered. All his fellow Gryffindors nodded.

"I think it would be best to finish read these books first, there maybe more to this then it seems," Dumbledore said wisely. He was sure Voldemort would have taken steps to make sure he was never truly defeated. He had several theories about how, though he thought he knew which one was true, even though he hoped it wasn't.

The Gryffindors looked unhappy about this, but realized it made sense.

"If everyone is done cheering, please continue reading, Evans," McGonagall said.

"What about those two?" James cut in with a grin, nodding towards the two Weasleys, who were oblivious to the rest of the room as they had chosen to celebrate the downfall of Voldemort with a kiss that had become increasingly vigorous. Little Bill stared on in confusion, clapping his hands and saying 'Bad man gone! Bad man gone!"

"Um, Mr. And Mrs. Weasley," Lily called hesitantly. The two broke apart, the bright red of their cheeks clashing brilliantly with their hair.

"Well, continue reading, Miss. Evans," Molly said briskly to much laughter from the children. Dumbledore was watching on, amused, while McGonagall tried to hide a smirk.

**Even Muggles like yourself should be celebrating, this happy, happy day!" And the old man hugged Mr. Dursley around the middle and walked off.**

**Mr. Dursley stood rooted to the spot. He had been hugged by a complete stranger. He also thought he had been called a Muggle, whatever that was.**

"Non-magical person," James said.

"We know, Potter," Lily sighed.

"He doesn't," James retorted.

"He's a character in a book," Lily retorted back. James opened his mouth and then shut it again – to Sirius and Remus' amusement. Severus was smirking – the only thing better than Lily putting Potter in his place was getting to do so himself.

**He was rattled. He hurried to his car and set off for home, hoping he was imagining things, which he had never hoped before, because he didn't approve of imagination.**

**As he pulled into the driveway of number four, the first thing he saw - and it didn't improve his mood - was the tabby cat he'd spotted that morning. It was now sitting on his garden wall. He was sure it was the same one; it had the same markings around its eyes.**

"Definitely sounds like you, Professor," Frank said.

**"Shoo!" said Mr. Dursley loudly. The cat didn't move. It just gave him a stern look.**

No one had to say a word for all of McGonagall's students, both past and present, to chuckle at that. Yes, it was definitely her.

**Was this normal cat behaviour. Mr. Dursley wondered. Trying to pull himself together, he let himself into the house. He was still determined not to mention anything to his wife.**

"Coward," James muttered again. His friends nodded in agreement.

**Mrs. Dursley had had a nice, normal day. She told him over dinner all about Mrs. Next Door's problems with her daughter and how Dudley had learned a new word ("Won't!").**

"That's not good," Molly muttered. Bill had recently been through the 'no' phase – it had driven her mad.

**Mr. Dursley tried to act normally. When Dudley had been put to bed, he went into the living room in time to catch the last report on the evening news: **

**"And finally, bird-watchers everywhere have reported that the nation's owls have been behaving very unusually today. Although owls normally hunt at night and are hardly ever seen in daylight, there have been hundreds of sightings of these birds flying in every direction since sunrise. Experts are unable to explain why the owls have suddenly changed their sleeping pattern." The newscaster allowed himself a grin.**

**"Most mysterious. And now, over to Jim McGuffin with the weather. Going to be any more showers of owls tonight, Jim."**

**"Well, Ted," said the weatherman, "I don't know about that, but it's not only the owls that have been acting oddly today. Viewers as far apart as Kent, Yorkshire, and Dundee have been phoning in to tell me that instead of the rain I promised yesterday, they've had a downpour of shooting stars! Perhaps people have been celebrating Bonfire Night early - it's not until next week, folks! **

Arthur smiled indulgently again. Bless them!

**But I can promise a wet night tonight." **

**Mr. Dursley sat frozen in his armchair. Shooting stars all over Britain. Owls flying by daylight. Mysterious people in cloaks all over the place.**

**And a whisper, a whisper about the Potters...**

**Mrs. Dursley came into the living room carrying two cups of tea. It was no good. He'd have to say something to her. He cleared his throat nervously. "Er - Petunia, dear**

Lily shared a look with Severus. It couldn't be. No, it really couldn't be - because if it really was her sister, that would mean she was James Potter's wife,and that was a stupid concept to even think about.

But still, the way the woman and her husband thought about Mrs. Potter. It hurt her to admit it, but she could see Petunia seeing her in the same light.

But still, it couldn't be. She would never marry James Potter. She wouldn't even date him.

Severus was following the same line of thought as Lily. The idea of her married to James Potter made him feel physically sick. She hates him, he reminded himself once more. You know she does, she would never marry him.

**- you haven't heard from your sister lately, have you?"**

**As he had expected, Mrs. Dursley looked shocked and angry. After all, they normally pretended she didn't have a sister.**

**"No," she said sharply. "Why?"**

**"Funny stuff on the news," Mr. Dursley mumbled. "Owls... shooting stars... and there were a lot of funny-looking people in town today..." **

**"So?" snapped Mrs. Dursley.**

**"Well, I just thought... maybe... it was something to do with... you know... her crowd."**

"Her crowd?" Lily murmured. She could easily hear those words being muttered in the disgusted tune Tuney always used when discussing her sister's world.

Several other people had muttered the words as well, insulted.

**Mrs. Dursley sipped her tea through pursed lips. Mr. Dursley wondered whether he dared tell her he'd heard the name "Potter." He decided he didn't dare.**

"Coward," Sirius muttered to James before he had a chance. James pouted.

**Instead he said, as casually as he could, "Their son - he'd be about Dudley's age now, wouldn't he." **

**"I suppose so," said Mrs. Dursley stiffly.**

"She doesn't even know how old her nephew is," Molly muttered, disgusted. If her brothers had kids she would do her best to know everything she could. In fact, she knew more about Arthur's nephews than this woman did her own.

**"What's his name again. Howard, isn't it."**

**"Harry. Nasty, common name, if you ask me." **

"I think it's a nice name," James defended.

"Well, you would, you picked it," Sirius teased.

**"Oh, yes," said Mr. Dursley, his heart sinking horribly. "Yes, I quite agree." He didn't say another word on the subject as they went upstairs to bed.**

**While Mrs. Dursley was in the bathroom, Mr. Dursley crept to the bedroom window and peered down into the front garden. The cat was still there.**

**It was staring down Privet Drive as though it were waiting for something.**

"What?" the Maruaders, Frank and Alice asked their Head of House.

"As this is the future, I'm afraid I don't know."

**Was he imagining things. Could all this have anything to do with the Potters. If it did... if it got out that they were related to a pair of - well, he didn't think he could bear it.**

**The Dursleys got into bed. Mrs. Dursley fell asleep quickly but Mr. Dursley lay awake, turning it all over in his mind. His last, comforting thought before he fell asleep was that even if the Potters were involved, there was no reason for them to come near him and Mrs. Dursley. The Potters knew very well what he and Petunia thought about**

**them and their kind... He couldn't see how he and Petunia could get mixed up in anything that might be going on - he yawned and turned over - it couldn't affect them...**

"Famous last words," Alice commented.

**How very wrong he was.**

"Told ya," she sang.

**Mr. Dursley might have been drifting into an uneasy sleep, but the cat on the wall outside was showing no sign of sleepiness. It was sitting as still as a statue, its eyes fixed unblinkingly on the far corner of Privet Drive. It didn't so much as quiver when a car door slammed on the next street, nor when two owls swooped overhead. In fact, it was nearly midnight before the cat moved at all.**

**A man appeared on the corner the cat had been watching, appeared so suddenly and silently you'd have thought he'd just popped out of the ground.**

"Apparation?" James asked. Several people shrugged in response – probably.

**The cat's tail twitched and its eyes narrowed.**

**Nothing like this man had ever been seen on Privet Drive. He was tall, thin, and very old, judging by the silver of his hair and beard, which were both long enough to tuck into his belt. He was wearing long robes, a purple cloak that swept the ground, and high-heeled, buckled boots.**

**His blue eyes were light, bright, and sparkling behind half-moon spectacles and his nose was very long and crooked, as though it had been broken at least twice.**

"Hmm… I wonder who that could be," Sirius said, mock-thoughtful, as he smiled over at his headmaster. Dumbledore just smiled in reply, eyes twinkling.

**This man's name was Albus Dumbledore.**

The Gryffindors cheered.

**Albus Dumbledore didn't seem to realize that he had just arrived in a street where everything from his name to his boots was unwelcome.**

Dumbledore chuckled. "I'm probably am aware and have just chosen to ignore that fact."

**He was busy rummaging in his cloak, looking for something. But he did seem to realize he was being watched, because he looked up suddenly at the cat, which was still staring at him from the other end of the street. For some reason, the sight of the cat seemed to amuse him. He chuckled and muttered, "I should have known." He found what he was looking for in his inside pocket. It seemed to be a silver cigarette lighter. He flicked it open, held it up in the air, and clicked it. The nearest street lamp went out with a little pop. He clicked it again - the next lamp flickered into darkness. **

"What's that, Professor?" James asked curiously.

"Sounds like my deluminator."

**Twelve times he clicked the Put-Outer,**

Dumbledore chuckled at the name.

**until the only lights left on the whole street were two tiny pinpricks in the distance, which were the eyes of the cat watching him. If anyone looked out of their window now, even beady-eyed Mrs. Dursley, they wouldn't be able to see anything that was happening down on the pavement. Dumbledore slipped the Put-Outer back inside his cloak and set off down the street toward number four, where he sat down on the wall next to the cat. He didn't look at it, but after a moment he spoke to it.**

**"Fancy seeing you here, Professor McGonagall."**

The Gryffindors cheered again. McGonagall tried to look at them sternly but was unable to, as she was secretly rather pleased at her students' show of affection.

**He turned to smile at the tabby, but it had gone. Instead he was smiling at a rather severe-looking woman who was wearing square glasses exactly the shape of the markings the cat had had around its eyes. She, too, was wearing a cloak, an emerald one.**

"Still," James sighed to his friends.

**Her black hair was drawn into a tight bun. She looked distinctly ruffled.**

James and Sirius pretended to gasp in shock.

**"How did you know it was me." she asked.**

"It was obvious," Frank said.

"Quiet, Longbottom."

**"My dear Professor, I've never seen a cat sit so stiffly."**

**"You'd be stiff if you'd been sitting on a brick wall all day," said Professor McGonagall.**

**"All day. When you could have been celebrating. I must have passed a dozen feasts and parties on my way here." Professor McGonagall sniffed angrily.**

**"Oh yes, everyone's celebrating, all right," she said impatiently.**

**"You'd think they'd be a bit more careful, but no - even the Muggles have noticed something's going on. It was on their news." She jerked her head back at the Dursleys' dark living-room window. "I heard it. Flocks of owls... shooting stars... Well, they're not completely stupid. They were bound to notice something. Shooting stars down in Kent - I'll bet that was Dedalus Diggle. He never had much sense."**

Molly and Arthur nodded at this – they had been at school with Dedalus.

**"You can't blame them," said Dumbledore gently. "We've had precious little to celebrate for eleven years."**

Everyone looked startled at this news.

"Nine more years of war," Molly said sadly, stroking her belly while watching Bill. Her children would grow up surrounded by war.

**"I know that," said Professor McGonagall irritably. "But that's no reason to lose our heads. People are being downright careless, out on the streets in broad daylight, not even dressed in Muggle clothes, swapping rumours." She threw a sharp, sideways glance at Dumbledore here, as though hoping he was going to tell her something, but he didn't, so she went on. "A fine thing it would be if, on the very day You-Know-Who seems to have disappeared at last, the Muggles found out about us all. I suppose he really has gone, Dumbledore." **

Everyone held their breath in anticipation.

**"It certainly seems so," said Dumbledore. **

"Seems so," Remus echoed. "So even you're not fully confident."

**"We have much to be thankful for. Would you care for a lemon drop." **

"What?" all the purebloods asked.

**"A what?" **

**"A lemon drop. They're a kind of Muggle sweet I'm rather fond of" **

**"No, thank you," said Professor McGonagall coldly, as though she didn't think this was the moment for lemon drops.**

It never is, she thought to herself, shaking her head. Albus and his sweets.

**"As I say, even if You-Know-Who has gone -" **

**"My dear Professor, surely a sensible person like yourself can call him by his name. All this 'You- Know-Who' nonsense - for eleven years I have been trying to persuade people to call him by his proper name:**

Lily looked up then, paling slightly. "Do I have to say it?" she asked, eyes on her headmaster.

"Fear of the name only increases fear of the things itself," Dumbledore replied calmly.

Lily took a deep breath and readied herself.

**Voldemort." **

Even though they had been expecting it everyone but Dumbledore and Lily flinched. Lily was surprised by how easy it was to say it.

**Professor McGonagall flinched, but Dumbledore, who was unsticking two lemon drops, seemed not to notice. "It all gets so confusing if we keep saying 'You-Know-Who.' I have never seen any reason to be frightened of saying Voldemort's name.**

Saying the name was much easier for Lily the second time round. Everyone else but Dumbledore still flinched horribly. Though James had noticed how Lily had said it without flinching and was determined to do the same.

**"I know you haven 't, said Professor McGonagall, sounding half exasperated, half admiring. "But you're different. Everyone knows you're the only one You-Know- oh, all right, Voldemort, was frightened of."**

**"You flatter me," said Dumbledore calmly. "Voldemort had powers I will never have."**

"Only because you'd never use them, sir," Arthur said. Molly nodded fervently, as did all the Gryffindors, including their Head of House.

"Thank you, Arthur. And since you are no longer a student here, I think we can agree to first name terms."

**"Only because you're too - well - noble to use them."**

Several people chuckled, looking between Arthur and McGonagall.

**"It's lucky it's dark. I haven't blushed so much since Madam Pomfrey told me she liked my new earmuffs." **

James and Sirius started guffawing at that, while Remus hid a smile. Lily and Severus watched them with disgust. Arthur would have laughed but knew Molly would glare at him.

Clearing her throat loudly to be heard over them, Lily started to read again determinedly.

**Professor McGonagall shot a sharp look at Dumbledore and said, "The owls are nothing next to the rumours that are flying around. You know what everyone's saying. About why he's disappeared. About what finally stopped him." It seemed that Professor McGonagall had reached the point she was most anxious to discuss, the real reason she had been waiting on a cold, hard wall all day, for neither as a cat nor as a woman had she fixed Dumbledore with such a piercing stare as she did now.**

James and Sirius had sobered up as everyone listened intently.

**It was plain that whatever "everyone" was saying, she was not going to believe it until Dumbledore told her it was true. Dumbledore, however, was choosing another lemon drop and did not answer.**

**"What they're saying," she pressed on, "is that last night Voldemort turned up in Godric's Hollow. He went to find the Potters.**

James paled. "He came after my family?" he whispered in horror. He looked at Lily expectedly, wanting her to read on as quickly as possible. But Lily, who had already read the next line, had paled as much as he had.

It couldn't be. She was James Potter's wife and she was dead. She didn't know which one of them was harder to digest.

"Lily!" James called anxiously. Her reaction only worried him more – was he dead? Were his parents dead? Were his unknown wife and son dead?

Severus, worried by Lily's reaction, leaned over her shoulder to read. He gasped. He was so focused on the words 'Lily and James Potter' that it took him a few seconds for the rest of the sentence to impact on him. Dead. In this future, Lily was dead. He would rather have her alive as Lily Potter than dead.

"We're dead," Lily finally murmured.

"We?" James questioned.

"Me and you," Lily replied. James was so flabbergasted by this news he forgot to celebrate that this meant he had married Lily.

"No!" Sirius shouted. He may have only known him for a year and a half, but James was the closest person to him in the world. Closer than his own brother.

Molly found herself crying for the two children – she barely knew them and yet they had quickly grown on her as they read. James, along with his friend Sirius, reminded her of her brothers, and Lily reminded her of herself slightly. Arthur wrapped his arm around her waist, trying to comfort her, while watching the children in front of him.

"Would you like me to read, Miss. Evans?" Dumbledore asked kindly. Numbly, she nodded.

**The rumor is that Lily and James Potter are - are - that they're - dead. " Dumbledore bowed his head. Professor McGonagall gasped.**

**"Lily and James... I can't believe it... I didn't want to believe it... Oh, Albus..." **

"Nice to know you care, Professor," James said thickly, trying to shoulder on despite the news he had just been given. In nine years, he would be dead. Lily would be dead. And his son, Harry, would presumably be dead. He would have a life he could only currently dream of stripped away from him.

McGonagall nodded at him. She would never admit it, but she had a soft spot for the Potter boy and his friends. Despite their pranks they were also amazing students. And Lily, bright, intelligent, and hard-working. They didn't deserve to die so young. She understood why her future self was upset.

**Dumbledore reached out and patted her on the shoulder. "I know... I know..." he said heavily.**

**Professor McGonagall's voice trembled as she went on. "That's not all. They're saying he tried to kill the Potter's son, Harry.**

James' eyes narrowed. Lily gasped, realizing this Harry was her son, too.

**But - he couldn't. He couldn't kill that little boy. No one knows why, or how, but they're saying that when he couldn't kill Harry Potter, Voldemort's power somehow broke - and that's why he's gone.**

There was stunned silence.

"Hey, Jamesie, your son beat You-Know-Who. He's awesome!" Sirius shouted, trying to break through the melancholy

James smiled slightly.

**Dumbledore nodded glumly.**

**"It's - it's true." faltered Professor McGonagall. "After all he's done... all the people he's killed... he couldn't kill a little boy.**

"But why?" Frank asked, astonished. Everyone turned to look at Dumbledore.

"I don't know. Perhaps if we continue to read, we shall see."

**It's just astounding... of all the things to stop him... but how in the name of heaven did Harry survive." **

**"We can only guess," said Dumbledore. "We may never know." Professor McGonagall pulled out a lace handkerchief and dabbed at her eyes beneath her spectacles. Dumbledore gave a great sniff as he took a golden watch from his pocket and examined it. It was a very odd watch.**

Arthur and Molly smiled, thinking about their own odd clock.

**It had twelve hands but no numbers; instead, little planets were moving around the edge. It must have made sense to Dumbledore, though, because he put it back in his pocket and said, "Hagrid's late. I suppose it was he who told you I'd be here, by the way." **

**"Yes," said Professor McGonagall. "And I don't suppose you're going to tell me why you're here, of all places." **

**"I've come to bring Harry to his aunt and uncle. They're the only family he has left now."**

"What?" James shouted, indignant at the idea of his son being left with the horrendous Muggles they'd just read about.

"But Tuney hates magic," Lily told her headmaster. "Ever since you said she couldn't come to Hogwarts."

Everyone looked at Lily curiously. "When I got my letter, Petunia wrote to Hogwarts asking if she could come with me."

**"You don't mean - you can't mean the people who live here." cried Professor McGonagall, jumping to her feet and pointing at number four.**

"Least someone has some sense," James muttered, his respect for his headmaster temporarily forgotten.

"Talk about over-anxious parents," Sirius joked at him. That still seemed strange to James, not just that he had a son, but that he was someone's parent. In nine years time, he would have a son who relied on him. He couldn't handle that responsibility!

**"Dumbledore - you can't. I've been watching them all day. You couldn't find two people who are less like us. And they've got this son - I saw him kicking his mother all the way up the street, screaming for sweets.**

"Your nephew sounds lovely, Evans," Sirius teased sarcastically. Lily didn't reply, she couldn't argue against that statement.

**Harry Potter come and live here!"**

**"It's the best place for him," said Dumbledore firmly. "His aunt and uncle will be able to explain everything to him when he's older. I've written them a letter." **

"A letter?" everyone exclaimed looking at Dumbledore incredulously.

**"A letter." repeated Professor McGonagall faintly, sitting back down on the wall. "Really, Dumbledore, you think you can explain all this in a letter. These people will never understand him! He'll be famous - a legend - I wouldn't be surprised if today was known as Harry Potter day in the future - there will be books written about Harry - every child in our world will know his name!" **

**"Exactly," said Dumbledore, looking very seriously over the top of his half-moon glasses. "It would be enough to turn any boy's head. Famous before he can walk and talk! Famous for something he won't even remember! Can't you see how much better off he'll be, growing up away from all that until he's ready to take it." **

"Doubt it'll make much difference considering who his father is," Severus muttered. Lily privately agreed. What was she thinking, having a son with James Potter?

**Professor McGonagall opened her mouth, changed her mind, swallowed, and then said, "Yes - yes, you're right, of course. But how is the boy getting here, Dumbledore." She eyed his cloak suddenly as though she thought he might be hiding Harry underneath it.**

The Gryffindors, except Lily, snorted at their Head of House's action, she tried her best to glare at them all.

**"Hagrid's bringing him."**

**"You think it - wise - to trust Hagrid with something as important as this." **

"Hey!" the Marauders protested. Hagrid was a friend of theirs.

"**I would trust Hagrid with my life," said Dumbledore.**

**"I'm not saying his heart isn't in the right place," said Professor McGonagall grudgingly, "but you can't pretend he's not careless. He does tend to - what was that." A low rumbling sound had broken the silence around them. It grew steadily louder as they looked up and down the street for some sign of a headlight; it swelled to a roar as they both looked up at the sky - and a huge motorcycle fell out of the air and landed on the road in front of them.**

"Cool!" Sirius and James shouted. Arthur decided he had to get one.

**If the motorcycle was huge, it was nothing to the man sitting astride it. He was almost twice as tall as a normal man and at least five times as wide. He looked simply too big to be allowed, and so wild - long tangles of bushy black hair and beard hid most of his face, he had hands the size of trash can lids, and his feet in their leather boots were like baby dolphins. In his vast, muscular arms he was holding a bundle of blankets.**

"Harry," Lily and James whispered. Somehow, they both already cared for the son they had never even met.

**"Hagrid," said Dumbledore, sounding relieved. "At last. And where did you get that motorcycle."**

**"Borrowed it, Professor Dumbledore, sir," said the giant, climbing carefully off the motorcycle as he spoke. "Young Sirius Black lent it to me. I've got him, sir." **

"Awesome!" Sirius cheered. Then he remembered why he would have been there – to see if his best friend and his wife were really dead. His face fell at the thought.

**"No problems, were there." **

**"No, sir - house was almost destroyed, but I got him out all right before the Muggles started swarmin' around. He fell asleep as we was flyin' over Bristol." Dumbledore and Professor McGonagall bent forward over the bundle of blankets. Inside, just visible, was a baby boy, fast asleep. Under a tuft of jet-black hair over his forehead they could see a curiously shaped cut, like a bolt of lightning.**

"Why would he-" Lily began to ask before realizing no one would know. "Read on, sir, perhaps it will tell us."

**"Is that where -." whispered Professor McGonagall.**

**"Yes," said Dumbledore. "He'll have that scar forever."**

**"Couldn't you do something about it, Dumbledore."**

**"Even if I could, I wouldn't. Scars can come in handy. I have one myself above my left knee that is a perfect map of the London Underground.**

"Can you show us, sir?" Sirius asked, trying his best to forget about James' death. They were going to change that – he reminded himself. That why they were here in the first place.

"Perhaps later, Mr. Black."

**Well - give him here, Hagrid - we'd better get this over with." Dumbledore took Harry in his arms and turned toward the Dursleys' house.**

**"Could I - could I say good-bye to him, sir." asked Hagrid. He bent his great, shaggy head over Harry and gave him what must have been a very scratchy, whiskery kiss. Then, suddenly, Hagrid let out a howl like a wounded dog.**

**"Shhh!" hissed Professor McGonagall, "you'll wake the Muggles!"**

**"S-s-sorry," sobbed Hagrid, taking out a large, spotted handkerchief and burying his face in it. "But I c-c-can't stand it - Lily an' James dead - an' poor little Harry off ter live with Muggles -" **

James smiled sadly at his friend's concern.

**"Yes, yes, it's all very sad, but get a grip on yourself, Hagrid, or we'll be found," Professor McGonagall whispered, patting Hagrid gingerly on the arm as Dumbledore stepped over the low garden wall and walked to the front door. He laid Harry gently on the doorstep, took a letter out of his cloak, tucked it inside Harry's blankets, and then came back to the other two. For a full minute the three of them stood and looked at the little bundle; Hagrid's shoulders shook, Professor McGonagall blinked furiously, and the twinkling light that usually shone from Dumbledore's eyes seemed to have gone out.**

**"Well," said Dumbledore finally, "that's that. We've no business staying here. We may as well go and join the celebrations."**

**"Yeah," said Hagrid in a very muffled voice, "I'll be takin' Sirius his bike back. G'night, Professor McGonagall - Professor Dumbledore, sir." Wiping his streaming eyes on his jacket sleeve, Hagrid swung himself onto the motorcycle and kicked the engine into life; with a roar it rose into the air and off into the night.**

**"I shall see you soon, I expect, Professor McGonagall," said Dumbledore, nodding to her. Professor McGonagall blew her nose in reply.**

**Dumbledore turned and walked back down the street. On the corner he stopped and took out the silver Put-Outer. He clicked it once, and twelve balls of light sped back to their street lamps so that Privet Drive glowed suddenly orange and he could make out a tabby cat slinking around the corner at the other end of the street. He could just see the bundle of blankets on the step of number four.**

**"Good luck, Harry," he murmured. He turned on his heel and with a swish of his cloak, he was gone.**

**A breeze ruffled the neat hedges of Privet Drive, which lay silent and tidy under the inky sky, the very last place you would expect astonishing things to happen. Harry Potter rolled over inside his blankets without waking up. One small hand closed on the letter beside him and he slept on, not knowing he was special, not knowing he was famous, not knowing he would be woken in a few hours' time by Mrs. Dursley's scream as she opened the front door to put out the milk bottles, nor that he would spend the next few weeks being prodded and pinched by his cousin Dudley.**

James eye's narrowed again. He didn't like the sound of this Dudley kid.

**He couldn't know that at this very moment, people meeting in secret all over the country were holding up their glasses and saying in hushed voices: "To Harry Potter - the boy who lived!".**

"That's the end of the chapter," Dumbledore announced. "Miss. Evans, Mr. Potter, I think it is best to remember what the letter said. We are here to change this," he said gravely.

"So no reason to cry," Sirius added. James nodded absent-mindedly, telling himself he was going to force himself to enjoy the rest of the book. Then he noticed Lily and suddenly smiled, remembering.

"So Lils, all things considered, fancying changing your answer?" he asked with a cheeky grin.

"I don't know what happened to me in the future, Potter, but right now I wouldn't touch you with a seven foot barge pole," she said disdainfully.

Everyone but James laughed and the tension in the room broke.

"What's a barge pole?" James muttered to Remus and Sirius, who both shrugged.

"Who wants to read next?" Dumbledore asked. "Or shall we go round the circle?" Everyone nodded. "All yours then, Minerva."

* * *

><p><strong>Everyone in character? React how'd you'd expect? I love to hear your opinions :)<strong>


	3. The Vanishing Glass

McGonagall took the book her colleague passed her and began to read.

**CHAPTER TWO.**

**THE VANISHING GLASS.**

"Sounds like accidental magic," Frank commented.

**Nearly ten years had passed since the Dursleys had woken up to find their nephew on the front step, but Privet Drive had hardly changed at all. The sun rose on the same tidy front gardens and lit up the brass number four on the Dursleys' front door; it crept into their living room, which was almost exactly the same as it had been on the night when Mr. Dursley had seen that fateful news report about the owls. Only the photographs on the mantelpiece really showed how much time had passed.**

**Ten years ago, there had been lots of pictures of what looked like a large pink beach ball wearing different-coloured bonnets - but Dudley Dursley was no longer a baby, and now the photographs showed a large blond boy riding his first bicycle, on a carousel at the fair, playing a computer game with his father, being hugged and kissed by his mother.**

**The room held no sign at all that another boy lived in the house, too.**

"Maybe I came and rescued him," Sirius said hopefully.

**Yet Harry Potter was still there,**

"Darn!"

**asleep at the moment, but not for long. His Aunt Petunia was awake and it was her shrill voice that made the first noise of the day.**

**"Up! Get up! Now!" Harry woke with a start. His aunt rapped on the door again.**

"I see Tuney's as lovely as always," Severus sneered.

Even the Marauders couldn't argue with him over that.

**"Up!" she screeched. Harry heard her walking toward the kitchen and then the sound of the frying pan being put on the stove. He rolled onto his back and tried to remember the dream he had been having. It had been a good one. There had been a flying motorcycle in it. He had a funny feeling he'd had the same dream before.**

"Not a dream," James said. "That was your Uncle Sirius' bike."

"Uncle Sirius?" his friend questioned. James smirked at him.

"Ah shut it, Dad," Sirius teased. James laughed at that – bizarre as it was he had accepted the child he was reading about was his son.

**His aunt was back outside the door.**

**"Are you up yet?" she demanded.**

"So polite," Alice said sarcastically.

**"Nearly," said Harry.**

**"Well, get a move on, I want you to look after the bacon.**

"Isn't he ten years old?" Molly asked. She would never force one of her children to cook – especially not at eleven.

**And don't you dare let it burn, I want everything perfect on Duddy's birthday." Harry groaned.**

**"What did you say?" his aunt snapped through the door.**

**"Nothing, nothing..." Dudley's birthday - how could he have forgotten. Harry got slowly out of bed and started looking for socks. He found a pair under his bed and, after pulling a spider off one of them, put them on. Harry was used to spiders, because the cupboard under the stairs was full of them, and that was where he slept.**

A few seconds of silence followed this. Lily laughed nervously. "I'm sorry, Professor, did the book just say my sister makes my son sleep in a cupboard?" she asked calmly. Too calm. McGonagall nodded – thankful she had taken Lily and James' wands off them.

Lily was too upset to be angry. Any hope she had at reconciling with her sister disappeared. If she hated her enough to force her son to sleep in a cupboard, what was the point of trying? It obviously didn't work.

"Lily," James said through gritted teeth. "If I show up at your house over the summer, don't worry, I'm only there to curse your sister."

"And I'll help," Sirius agreed quickly. These people were worse than his own family – at least he was given a room. The largest one at that.

"Potter, Black, you'll do no such thing," McGonagall said strictly.

"But, Professor, she made my son sleep in a cupboard!" James shouted indignantly.

"That as is it, it's still underage magic."

"Worth it," James and, to everyone's surprise, Lily muttered. James looked at her in shock.

"She's being totally unfair to him," Lily protested. "She would deserve it!"

"Everyone in favour of cursing Petunia?" James called, completely forgetting there were two Professors in the room.

All the Gryffindors and Severus raised their hands. Arthur considered it before deciding Molly would not appreciate it, though she looked fairly sickened by the idea of a child sleeping in a cupboard.

"What do you care?" James asked Severus incredulously.

Severus shrugged. "I've met Tuney, she deserves cursing, not just for this but for other things." Like calling Lily a freak, he added to himself.

"No-one will be cursing the older Evans," McGonagall said strictly.

"You can't curse your sister for a future crime, Miss. Evans," Dumbledore reminded her, though he, too, looked saddened by the news. "Perhaps you should read on, Minerva."

**When he was dressed he went down the hall into the kitchen. The table was almost hidden beneath all Dudley's birthday presents. It looked as though Dudley had gotten the new computer he wanted, not to mention the second television and the racing bike. Exactly why Dudley wanted a racing bike was a mystery to Harry, as Dudley was very fat and hated exercise - unless of course it involved punching somebody. Dudley's favourite punching bag was Harry,**

"Stay away from my son," James growled.

Lily sighed. And Petunia would do nothing to stop that, of course.

"What kind of parent allows that to happen under their own roof?" Molly asked, shocked.

"A rubbish one?" Alice chimed in, the sarcasm in her voice deadly.

**but he couldn't often catch him. Harry didn't look it, but he was very fast.**

**Perhaps it had something to do with living in a dark cupboard, but Harry had always been small and skinny for his age.**

"Or he just takes after his father," Remus commented innocently, smirking over at James.

**He looked even smaller and skinnier than he really was because all he had to wear were old clothes of Dudley's, and Dudley was about four times bigger than he was. Harry had a thin face, knobbly knees, black hair, and bright green eyes.**

"Definitely takes after you, Jamesie," Sirius teased. "Except the eyes."

"It sounds like he has my eyes," Lily said sadly. Severus didn't want to imagine that – a child that looked like Potter but with Lily's eyes.

**He wore round glasses held together with a lot of Scotch tape because of all the times Dudley had punched him on the nose. **

Everyone frowned. Lily sighed again.

**The only thing Harry liked about his own appearance was a very thin scar on his forehead that was shaped like a bolt of lightning. **

"He likes it?" Frank asked, surprised.

**He had had it as long as he could remember, and the first question he could ever remember asking his Aunt Petunia was how he had gotten it.**

**"In the car crash when your parents died," she had said.**

"Bitch!" Sirius growled.

"Language, Black!" McGonagall called again.

"Don't swear in front of my son, please," Molly said warningly. "Even if the woman deserves it," she added bitterly. How could anyone lie to a child about how his parents' died. They died as heroes and he had the right to know that.

"I suppose that explains why he likes the scar, he doesn't really understand where he got it from," Frank commented sadly.

**"And don't ask questions." Don't ask questions - that was the first rule for a quiet life with the Dursleys.**

"But how will he ever learn?" Arthur asked.

**Uncle Vernon entered the kitchen as Harry was turning over the bacon.**

**"Comb your hair!" he barked, by way of a morning greeting.**

Sirius and Remus laughed. "If it's anything like this one's hair," Sirius said with a nod in James' direction, "good luck with that, Harry!"

**About once a week, Uncle Vernon looked over the top of his newspaper and shouted that Harry needed a haircut. Harry must have had more haircuts than the rest of the boys in his class put together, but it made no difference, his hair simply grew that way - all over the place.**

James ran a hand through his hair, making it messier. Sirius and Remus laughed even more while Lily looked disgusted. Egotistical git, she thought disdainfully.

**Harry was frying eggs by the time Dudley arrived in the kitchen with his mother. Dudley looked a lot like Uncle Vernon. He had a large pink face, not much neck, small, watery blue eyes, and thick blond hair that lay smoothly on his thick, fat head.**

"A charmer, just like his father," Sirius commented to smirks from James and Remus.

**Aunt Petunia often said that Dudley looked like a baby angel **

All the Gryffindors snorted, except Lily who wondered how her sister could be so blind.

**Harry often said that Dudley looked like a pig in a wig.**

The Gryffindors laughed at that one, even Lily. Her son's sarcastic streak sounded much like her own.

**Harry put the plates of egg and bacon on the table, which was difficult as there wasn't much room. Dudley, meanwhile, was counting his presents.**

**His face fell.**

**"Thirty-six," he said, looking up at his mother and father. "That's two less than last year."**

"Thirty-six?" James asked. "I don't think I even got that much. But then again I never counted them, I was too busy opening them."

**"Darling, you haven't counted Auntie Marge's present, see, it's here under this big one from Mommy and Daddy." **

**"All right, thirty-seven then," said Dudley, going red in the face.**

**Harry, who could see a huge Dudley tantrum coming on, began wolfing down his bacon as fast as possible in case Dudley turned the table over.**

**Aunt Petunia obviously scented danger, too, because she said quickly, "And we'll buy you another two presents while we're out today. How's that, popkin? Two more presents. Is that all right?"**

"What kind of parenting is that?" Molly asked, appalled.

**Dudley thought for a moment. It looked like hard work. Finally he said slowly, "So I'll have thirty ... thirty..." **

"This kid is stupider than Potter and Black combined," Severus commented slyly.

"Snape, watch your mouth," McGonagall scolded. Prejudice Gryffindor, Severus thought.

**"Thirty-nine, sweetums," said Aunt Petunia.**

**"Oh." Dudley sat down heavily and grabbed the nearest parcel. "All right then." **

**Uncle Vernon chuckled. "Little tyke wants his money's worth, just like his father. 'Atta boy, Dudley!"**

"He's actually encouraging that?" Arthur asked, stunned. "You're right, dear. What kind of parenting is this?"

**He ruffled Dudley's hair.**

**At that moment the telephone**

"The fellytone!" Sirius shouted, just to annoy Lily, who scowled.

**rang and Aunt Petunia went to answer it while Harry and Uncle Vernon watched Dudley unwrap the racing bike, a video camera, a remote control airplane, sixteen new computer games, and a VCR.**

Arthur looked excited at all these new Muggle contraptions to learn about, while Molly, upon seeing his face, looked exasperated. The other purebloods in the room were confused, but didn't care enough to ask.

**He was ripping the paper off a gold wristwatch when Aunt Petunia came back from the telephone looking both angry and worried.**

**"Bad news, Vernon," she said. "Mrs. Figg's**

I've got Arabella watching him, Dumbledore thought. That suggested he was still expecting that something else might happen to Harry.

**broken her leg. She can't take him." She jerked her head in Harry's direction.**

**Dudley's mouth fell open in horror, but Harry's heart gave a leap. Every year on Dudley's birthday, his parents took him and a friend out for the day, to adventure parks, hamburger restaurants, or the movies. Every year, Harry was left behind with Mrs. Figg, a mad old lady who lived two streets away. Harry hated it there. The whole house smelled of cabbage and Mrs. Figg made him look at photographs of all the cats she'd ever owned.**

Why would Arabella do that? Dumbledore wondered. Then again, it seems if he'd enjoyed himself his family wouldn't have let him go.

**"Now what." said Aunt Petunia, looking furiously at Harry as though he'd planned this. Harry knew he ought to feel sorry that Mrs. Figg had broken her leg, but it wasn't easy when he reminded himself it would be a whole year before he had to look at Tibbles, Snowy, Mr. Paws, and Tufty again.**

**"We could phone Marge," Uncle Vernon suggested.**

**"Don't be silly, Vernon, she hates the boy."**

"He has a name," Lily spat at her book-sister.

**The Dursleys often spoke about Harry like this, as though he wasn't there - or rather, as though he was something very nasty that couldn't understand them, like a slug.**

"Evans, I stand by my earlier comment about your sister," Sirius told her. Lily didn't reply. She wanted to tell him off for insulting her sister, but a part of her agreed.

**"What about what's-her-name, your friend - Yvonne?" **

**"On vacation in Majorca," snapped Aunt Petunia.**

**"You could just leave me here," Harry put in hopefully (he'd be able to watch what he wanted on television for a change and maybe even have a go on Dudley's computer).**

**Aunt Petunia looked as though she'd just swallowed a lemon.**

**"And come back and find the house in ruins?" she snarled.**

"DO IT!" Sirius and James shouted.

"So she can punish him more?" Lily snapped back. They both frowned at that.

**"I won't blow up the house," said Harry, but they weren't listening.**

**"I suppose we could take him to the zoo," said Aunt Petunia slowly, "…and leave him in the car..."**

**"That car's new, he's not sitting in it alone..."**

"Yes, worry about _the car_," Molly said sarcastically.

**Dudley began to cry loudly. In fact, he wasn't really crying - it had been years since he'd really cried - but he knew that if he screwed up his face and wailed, his mother would give him anything he wanted.**

"More excellent parenting," Molly continued to mutter sarcastically. Her husband nodded grimly in agreement.

**"Dinky Duddydums,**

Everyone laughed.

"Your sister has the best nicknames!" Sirius told Lily.

**don't cry, Mummy won't let him spoil your special day!" she cried, flinging her arms around him.**

**"I... don't... want... him... t-t-to come!" Dudley yelled between huge, pretend sobs. "He always sp- spoils everything!" He shot Harry a nasty grin through the gap in his mother's arms.**

**Just then, the doorbell rang - "Oh, good Lord, they're here!" said Aunt Petunia frantically - and a moment later, Dudley's best friend, Piers Polkiss, walked in with his mother. Piers was a scrawny boy with a face like a rat. He was usually the one who held people's arms behind their backs while Dudley hit them.**

"I can't decide which one of them is worse," James exclaimed. Severus, looking at the two Gryffindors opposite him, felt the same way, but decided against saying anything this time. He found it incredibly hypocritical that Potter was the one bemoaning these bullying toe rags who reminded Severus so much of him and his idiot friend.

**Dudley stopped pretending to cry at once.**

**Half an hour later, Harry, who couldn't believe his luck, was sitting in the back of the Dursleys' car with Piers and Dudley, on the way to the zoo for the first time in his life. His aunt and uncle hadn't been able to think of anything else to do with him, but before they'd left, Uncle Vernon had taken Harry aside.**

**"I'm warning you," he had said, putting his large purple face right up close to Harry's,**

"Charming," Alice muttered.

**"I'm warning you now, boy - any funny business, anything at all - and you'll be in that cupboard from now until****Christmas." **

"Don't you dare allow that, Petunia," Lily whispered dangerously.

**"I'm not going to do anything," said Harry, "honestly.."**

**But Uncle Vernon didn't believe him. No one ever did.**

**The problem was, strange things often happened around Harry and it was just no good telling the Dursleys he didn't make them happen.**

**Once, Aunt Petunia, tired of Harry coming back from the barbers looking as though he hadn't been at all, had taken a pair of kitchen scissors and cut his hair so short he was almost bald except for his bangs, which she left "to hide that horrible scar." Dudley had laughed himself silly at Harry, who spent a sleepless night imagining school the next day, where he was already laughed at for his baggy clothes and taped glasses.**

**Next morning, however, he had gotten up to find his hair exactly as it had been before Aunt Petunia had sheared it off He had been given a week in his cupboard for this, even though he had tried to explain that he couldn't explain how it had grown back so quickly.**

"Accidental magic," several people said.

"You know this, Tuney," Lily sighed. "You saw me do it." And it scared you, she added mentally.

**Another time, Aunt Petunia had been trying to force him into a revolting old sweater of Dudley's (brown with orange puff balls) - The harder she tried to pull it over his head, the smaller it seemed to become, until finally it might have fitted a hand puppet, but certainly wouldn't fit Harry. Aunt Petunia had decided it must have shrunk in the wash and, to his great relief, Harry wasn't punished.**

**On the other hand, he'd gotten into terrible trouble for being found on the roof of the school kitchens. Dudley's gang had been chasing him as usual when, as much to Harry's surprise as anyone else's, there he was sitting on the chimney.**

"What?" all the Gryffindors and the Weasleys exclaimed.

"It can't be apparition, can it?" Frank asked. "That would be very powerful accidental magic."

"Maybe he flew!" James exclaimed. Lily and Severus shared a look, remembering her flying of a swing, though that had been different. Lily had not really been flying, just slowing down her fall.

"Either way, it's very powerful magic," Dumbledore said. "Not that surprising considering who his parents are." He graced both Lily and James with a smile. Both of them were looking a bit smug, James was less able to hide it than Lily.

**The Dursleys had received a very angry letter from Harry's headmistress telling them Harry had been climbing school buildings. But all he'd tried to do (as he shouted at Uncle Vernon through the locked door of his cupboard) was jump behind the big trash cans outside the kitchen doors. Harry supposed that the wind must have caught him in mid- jump.**

"That doesn't make sense," Frank commented.

"While he doesn't know the truth," James said hotly, defending his son.

"It's the only explanation he's got," Lily sighed. Her sadness at her sister's attitude was quickly becoming anger. How could Tuney do this to an innocent child!

**But today, nothing was going to go wrong.**

"He shouldn't have said that," Alice commented, reminded of his uncle's belief that 'it wouldn't affect them.' She had enough commonsense not to compare Harry to his uncle though. Lily and James would hate her for it and it would be cruel to compare the poor kid to moustache face – he didn't deserve that! Nobody did.

**It was even worth being with Dudley and Piers to be spending the day somewhere that wasn't school, his cupboard, or Mrs. Figg's cabbage-smelling living room.**

**While he drove, Uncle Vernon complained to Aunt Petunia. He liked to complain about things: people at work, Harry, the council, Harry, the bank, and Harry were just a few of his favourite subjects. **

"I think he likes to complain about Harry," Sirius said with mock thoughtfulness.

**This morning, it was motorcycles.**

**"... roaring along like maniacs, the young hoodlums," he said, as a motorcycle overtook them.**

**I had a dream about a motorcycle," said Harry, remembering suddenly. "It was flying."**

"Oh no!" Lily groaned. To her surprise, so did Potter, who knew he had that much commonsense.

"They won't like that," Remus said sadly. He wasn't just upset by the treatment of his friend's future son, he hated people with prejudices of any sort. He knew what it was like to have people be unwilling to see the real you because of what you were, and since coming to Hogwarts he had quickly picked up a hatred for the prejudice against Muggle-borns. And then there was these idiots with their prejudice against magic.

**Uncle Vernon nearly crashed into the car in front. He turned right around in his seat and yelled at Harry, his face like a gigantic beet with a moustache: "MOTORCYCLES DON'T FLY!" **

"Oh yes they do," Sirius sang. "At least mine does," he added proudly.

"I wonder how-" Arthur began thoughtfully but stopped when he saw the look on his wife's face.

**Dudley and Piers sniggered.**

**I know they don't," said Harry. "It was only a dream." But he wished he hadn't said anything. If there was one thing the Dursleys hated even more than his asking questions, it was his talking about anything acting in a way it shouldn't, no matter if it was in a dream or even a cartoon - they seemed to think he might get dangerous ideas.**

"Because they do think that," Lily said sadly. 

**It was a very sunny Saturday and the zoo was crowded with families. The Dursleys bought Dudley and Piers large chocolate ice creams at the entrance and then, because the smiling lady in the van had asked Harry what he wanted before they could hurry him away, they bought him a cheap lemon ice pop.**

"That was sorta nice," Alice said carefully.

"They should have bought him a chocolate one, too," James grumbled.

"We're not all spoilt, Potter," Severus said.

"Sev, I don't think that's what James meant," Lily told him quietly – she knew he was bemoaning the injustice her sister was showing… their son (Merlin, that was weird to think), not being spoilt.

Severus stared at her incredulously. Did she just defend Potter of all people? And she called him by his first name? The words 'Lily and James Potter' flashed into his head again, making him feel nauseous

**It wasn't bad, either, Harry thought, licking it as they watched a gorilla scratching its head who looked remarkably like Dudley, except that it wasn't blond.**

Everyone in the room laughed.

"Your son has a brilliant sense of humour," Sirius chuckled. "The next generation of Marauders – along with mine, Remus, and Peter's kids."

"Talking of Peter, I wonder why he isn't here?" Remus asked softly. He felt sorry for the boy – knowing how upset and jealous he would feel if he learnt Peter had been up to something with James and Sirius and excluding him.

His friends shrugged, though they had wondered the same when they got their letter. It had specifically said to not tell Peter.

"I am sure our future friend has their reason for who is here and who is not," Dumbledore said carefully. 

**Harry had the best morning he'd had in a long time. He was careful to walk a little way apart from the Dursleys so that Dudley and Piers, who were starting to get bored with the animals by lunchtime, wouldn't fall back on their favourite hobby of hitting him.**

Lily and James eyes narrowed once more. Severus, still smarting over Lily's defence of Potter, noticed Potter's hypocrisy once more. After all, he liked to curse him all the time for no reason and how was that different?

**They ate in the zoo restaurant, and when Dudley had a tantrum because his knickerbocker glory didn't have enough ice cream on top, Uncle Vernon bought him another one and Harry was allowed to finish the first.**

"So kind of him," Alice muttered sarcastically.

**Harry felt, afterward, that he should have known it was all too good to last.**

Alice sighed, confirmed right again. People really had to stop making such statements in these books.

**After lunch they went to the reptile house. It was cool and dark in there, with lit windows all along the walls. Behind the glass, all sorts of lizards and snakes were crawling and slithering over bits of wood and stone. Dudley and Piers wanted to see huge, poisonous cobras and thick, man-crushing pythons. Dudley quickly found the largest snake in the place. It could have wrapped its body twice around Uncle Vernon's car and crushed it into a trash can - but at the moment it didn't look in the mood. In fact, it was fast asleep.**

**Dudley stood with his nose pressed against the glass, staring at the glistening brown coils.**

**"Make it move," he whined at his father. Uncle Vernon tapped on the glass, but the snake didn't budge.**

**"Do it again," Dudley ordered. Uncle Vernon rapped the glass smartly with his knuckles, but the snake just snoozed on.**

**"This is boring," Dudley moaned. He shuffled away.**

**Harry moved in front of the tank and looked intently at the snake. He wouldn't have been surprised if it had died of boredom itself - no company except stupid people drumming their fingers on the glass trying to disturb it all day long. It was worse than having a cupboard as a bedroom, where the only visitor was Aunt Petunia hammering on the door to wake you up; at least he got to visit the rest of the house.**

"My son just compared himself to a snake," James muttered angrily.

"Don't let old Gonnie know, but we'll still find a way to curse Evans' sister and this Dursley character too," Sirius whispered in his ear.

James smirked, already imagining all the ways they could get them back.

**The snake suddenly opened its beady eyes. Slowly, very slowly, it raised its head until its eyes were on a level with Harry's.**

**It winked.**

"Can snakes do that?" Molly asked. No one answered, everyone was looking at each other confused. For nobody thought snakes could wink –yet the book had clearly just said one did.

**Harry stared. Then he looked quickly around to see if anyone was watching. They weren't. He looked back at the snake and winked, too.**

"This can't end well," Lily muttered miserably.

**The snake jerked its head toward Uncle Vernon and Dudley, then raised its eyes to the ceiling. It gave Harry a look that said quite plainly: "I get that all the time."**

**"I know," Harry murmured through the glass, though he wasn't sure the snake could hear him. "It must be really annoying."**

"The snake can't understand you, Jamesie Jnr.," Sirius said cheerfully, trying to diffuse the tense atmosphere.

**The snake nodded vigorously.**

Everyone looked worried once more – this wasn't normal. The two Professors, Severus and Sirius had figured out what that could possibly mean, but that couldn't be right. The son of two Gryffindors? Impossible.

**"Where do you come from, anyway?" Harry asked.**

**The snake jabbed its tail at a little sign next to the glass. Harry peered at it.**

**Boa Constrictor, Brazil.**

**"Was it nice there?" The boa constrictor jabbed its tail at the sign again and Harry read on: This specimen was bred in the zoo. "Oh, I see - so you've never been to Brazil." As the snake shook its head, a deafening shout behind Harry made both of them jump.**

**"DUDLEY! MR. DURSLEY! COME AND LOOK AT THIS SNAKE! YOU WON'T BELIEVE WHAT IT'S DOING!" Dudley came waddling toward them as fast as he could.**

**"Out of the way, you," he said, punching Harry in the ribs. Caught by surprise, Harry fell hard on the concrete floor. What came next happened so fast no one saw how it happened - one second, Piers and Dudley were leaning right up close to the glass, the next, they had leapt back with howls of horror.**

**Harry sat up and gasped; the glass front of the boa constrictor's tank had vanished. The great snake was uncoiling itself rapidly, slithering out onto the floor. People throughout the reptile house screamed and started running for the exits.**

**As the snake slid swiftly past him, Harry could have sworn a low, hissing voice said, "Brazil, here I come... Thanksss, amigo."**

There had been silence as McGonagall read, everyone held back their comments so as to be able to read on and hopefully get a better understanding of the strange situation.

"What does that mean?" James finally asked.

"It sounds like he's a Parseltongue," Sirius explained, to James' surprise.

"A what?" James asked.

"Someone who can talk to snakes," Severus sneered, knowing exactly what Potter would think of that.

"It's Dark Magic," Sirius added unwillingly. "I found some books on it in my parent's library." He cursed himself for saying that as soon as he had – he didn't like discussing what his parents, or even worse his nut job cousin, were like with James, who hated anything to do with the Dark Side. His parents would have called James and his family 'blood traitors'.

"Why can my son do it then?" James exclaimed sharply. "My son isn't evil!"

"Just because something's associated with the dark, doesn't mean everyone who can do it is," Remus snapped at him, more sharply than he had intended. Everyone always assumed werewolves were evil, but he knew he wasn't. Even if Harry was a Parseltongue it didn't make him evil. It also saddened him to see James react this way – what would he do when he learnt the truth about Remus?

**The keeper of the reptile house was in shock.**

**"But the glass," he kept saying, "where did the glass go."**

**The zoo director himself made Aunt Petunia a cup of strong, sweet tea while he apologized over and over again. Piers and Dudley could only gibber. As far as Harry had seen, the snake hadn't done anything except snap playfully at their heels as it passed, but by the time they were all back in Uncle Vernon's car, Dudley was telling them how it had nearly bitten off his leg, while Piers was swearing it had tried to squeeze him to death. But worst of all, for Harry at least, was Piers calming down enough to say, "Harry was talking to it, weren't you, Harry?"**

"Damnit!" James swore.

"Language," both Molly and McGonagall scolded.

**Uncle Vernon waited until Piers was safely out of the house before starting on Harry. He was so angry he could hardly speak. He managed to say, "Go - cupboard - stay - no meals," **

"No meals?" Lily murmured.

"It can't possibly mean that," Molly said comfortingly. No one, not even these horrible Muggles, could be so cruel as to starve a child.

**before he collapsed into a chair, and Aunt Petunia had to run and get him a large brandy.**

**Harry lay in his dark cupboard much later, wishing he had a watch. He didn't know what time it was and he couldn't be sure the Dursleys were asleep yet. Until they were, he couldn't risk sneaking to the kitchen for some food.**

**He'd lived with the Dursleys almost ten years, ten miserable years, as long as he could remember, ever since he'd been a baby and his parents had died in that car crash.**

Everybody looked murderous at the reminder of the slanderous lie.

**He couldn't remember being in the car when his parents had died. Sometimes, when he strained his memory during long hours in his cupboard, he came up with a strange vision: a blinding flash of green light **

Sirius and McGonagall gasped. Dumbledore looked intrigued and saddened at the same time.

"The killing curse," Dumbledore explained quietly.

Sirius was remembering the day last Christmas when he had been forced to visit his aunt and uncle's house. He'd been stuck in a room with Cissy and Reg and they'd found themselves discussing the latest family scandal – Andy's marriage and subsequent disownment. He had been defending his favourite cousin when who should walk in but Bella, the crazy bitch. She had gotten completely mad at him, calling Andy a 'blood traitor' and saying he was shaping in to one, too. Then she had drawn her wand on him, he had thought she was going to curse him, but then one of the Black family house elves had come into the room. With a twisted smile, Bella had pointed her wand at the elf instead, telling him he was getting old. In a flash of green light, the elf lay dead on the floor. Bella then turned back to Sirius, wand at his throat once more, and made him say that Andy was a blood traitor, no longer a part of their family, and would be better of dead.

Everyone in the room was quiet, too shocked to say anything.

"He remembers," Lily whispered sadly. Both James and Severus wanted to comfort her but didn't know how.

**and a burn- ing pain on his forehead. This, he supposed, was the crash, though he couldn't imagine where all the green light came from. He couldn't remember his parents at all. His aunt and uncle never spoke about them, and of course he was forbidden to ask questions. There were no photographs of them in the house.**

**When he had been younger, Harry had dreamed and dreamed of some unknown relation coming to take him away, but it had never happened; the Dursleys were his only family. Yet sometimes he thought (or maybe hoped) that strangers in the street seemed to know him. Very strange strangers they were, too. A tiny man in a violet top hat had bowed to him once while out shopping with Aunt Petunia and Dudley. After asking Harry furiously if he knew the man, Aunt Petunia had rushed them out of the shop without buying anything. A wild-looking old woman dressed all in green had waved merrily at him once on a bus. A bald man in a very long purple coat had actually shaken his hand in the street the other day and then walked away without a word. The weirdest thing about all these people was the way they seemed to vanish the second Harry tried to get a closer look.**

James didn't know whether to smile or frown. It was nice that these strangers were being nice to his son, but it was wrong that this was all Harry saw of the magical world. Of the world he belonged in, but didn't even know about.

**At school, Harry had no one. Everybody knew that Dudley's gang hated that odd Harry Potter in his baggy old clothes and broken glasses, and nobody liked to disagree with Dudley's gang.**

"That's the end of the chapter," McGonagall said, her voice sad. A melancholy atmosphere hung over everyone.

In the silence, Sirius' belly rumbled.

"Perhaps we should have dinner now?" Molly suggested.


	4. The Letters From No One

As promised, a dining table laded with food appeared in the room, alongside eleven chairs and a highchair. Dumbledore sat at the head of the table with McGonagall to his left, and the three Marauders to his right as McGonagall had wanted to be able to watch them. Beside them sat Arthur and Molly, while Bill's highchair was beside the other end of the table. Severus sat opposite Molly, as far away from the Marauders as possible. Lily was beside him, and then Alice, and then Frank, who was a little uneasy at being sat beside his strict Head of House.

As they eat, Sirius and James began to discuss in whispers their plan to get revenge on the Dursleys. James would also glance occasionally at Lily, wondering how to get her to agree to go out with him.

Remus was sat on Dumbledore's right-hand side and was watching him, wondering how best to ask him about the full moon without attracting everyone else's attention.

Dumbledore, however, hadn't noticed, as McGonagall was busy telling him that, heaven forbid, Lily and James did die in the future, they were not sending Harry to the Dursleys. Dumbledore did not disagree with his friend's stern words, but he had an idea of why he would send Harry to his family, but would wait and see if the books proved him right or wrong.

Frank was deep in conversation with Alice about Gryffindor's last Quidditch match. He liked her humorous take on things and wondered why he hadn't talked to her more often before.

Lily was eating in silence, contemplating everything she had learnt so far. Her sister's hatred stung at her repeatedly. But the real problem was that she found herself hoping she still had Harry in the future, and then realizing she was hoping she was James Potter's wife.

Severus was also eating in silence, while occasionally sneaking glances at Lily's thoughtful face. She couldn't possible be contemplating saying yes to Potter, could she?

Molly was feeding Bill, while her unborn son kicked inside her. Arthur was laughing and joking with her, but she was having to fake her interest. She was still worried by what this strange book was about and how it concerned her family.

When everyone was finally full, they made their way back to the sofas and chairs.

"I believe it's your turn, Lupin."

Remus took the book of his Transfiguration Professor and started to read.

**CHAPTER THREE.**

**THE LETTERS FROM NO ONE.**

"Hey, isn't Harry nearly eleven?" James asked excitedly. A few people thought about before nodding.

"Awesome! Hogwarts!" the Marauders yelled.

Lily, rather than being annoyed at their antics, smiled at the thought of her son going to Hogwarts. She loved her school.

Sirius hoped Harry could find a home here just like he had since Harry had a horrible home life like him. Though he had to admit Harry's was even worse.

**The escape of the Brazilian boa constrictor earned Harry his longest-ever punishment. By the time he was allowed out of his cupboard again, the summer holidays had started and Dudley had already broken his new video camera, crashed his remote control airplane, and, first time out on his racing bike, knocked down old Mrs. Figg as she crossed Privet Drive on her crutches.**

**Harry was glad school was over, but there was no escaping Dudley's gang, who visited the house every single day. Piers, Dennis, Malcolm, and Gordon were all big and stupid, but as Dudley was the biggest and stupidest of the lot, he was the leader.**

"Excellent logic," Sirius drawled sarcastically.

"Is that why you use it then?" Severus asked with a pointed look at James.

"Watch it, Snivellus," James spat.

"Yeah, James is smart," Sirius defended his friend. "And scrawny," he added as an afterthought.

"Yeah," James said agreeably. "Hey!" he shouting indignantly at Sirius' extra comment. Sirius just smirked at him.

**The rest of them were all quite happy to join in Dudley's favourite sport: Harry Hunting.**

"Bastards," James spat out angrily.

"Language," Molly and McGonagall scolded.

"Hypocrite," Severus muttered, no longer able to control his temper.

"What did you say?" James growled threateningly.

"You heard me," Severus replied. James stood up menacingly, so did Sirius.

"Potter! Black! Sat down!" McGonagall ordered.

"Two on one?" Severus asked the boys sarcastically. "Who's the coward now?"

"Just because you have no friends to back you up!" James pointed out mockingly.

"Leave him alone, Potter," Lily spoke up, she would have earlier but McGonagall beat her to it. "You too, Sev."

"Me?" Severus said, flabbergasted. "He is a hypocrite!"

"Am not!"

"You treat me like Dudley treats Harry!"

"Do not!" James argued back stubbornly. But Severus' words had made their mark. He didn't, did he? The odd curse or taunt here and there, but Severus deserved it. Stinking oddball Slytherin, probably up to his eyeballs in the Dark Arts like the rest of the snakes. "You deserve it," he spat out angrily. "And it's not always us who starts it, is it?" he added angrily, thinking of Severus' insults about Sirius and Remus.

"Lupin, please continue to read," McGonagall ordered. "We will discuss this later," she added sternly.

**This was why Harry spent as much time as possible out of the house, wandering around and thinking about the end of the holidays, where he could see a tiny ray of hope. When September came he would be going off to secondary school and, for the first time in his life, he wouldn't be with Dudley.**

"His aunt and uncle told him about Hogwarts?" Arthur asked, surprised.

"Probably not," Lily said sadly.

** Dudley had been accepted at Uncle Vernon's old private school, Smeltings. Piers Polkiss was going there too. Harry, on the other hand, was going to Stonewall High,**

"Oh," Arthur muttered.

"No, you're not, Harry, you're going Hogwarts," James told his book-son. He was trying to concentrate on the story and not what the stupid Slytherin had said.

**the local public school. Dudley thought this was very funny.**

**"They stuff people's heads down the toilet the first day at Stonewall," he told Harry. "Want to come upstairs and practice?" **

**"No, thanks," said Harry. "The poor toilet's never had anything as horrible as your head down it - it might be sick." **

All the Gryffindors and the Weasleys laughed. Dumbledore's eyes twinkled with amusement, while McGonagall tried her best to hide her smirk. Severus would have laughed, but he refused to find anything Potter's son said funny.

**Then he ran, before Dudley could work out what he'd said.**

**One day in July, Aunt Petunia took Dudley to London to buy his Smeltings uniform, leaving Harry at Mrs. Figg's. Mrs. Figg wasn 't as bad as usual. It turned out she'd broken her leg tripping over one of her cats, and she didn't seem quite as fond of them as before. She let Harry watch television and gave him a bit of chocolate cake that tasted as though she'd had it for several years.**

"Sounds like Hagrid's cooking," Sirius said. Everyone but Severus nodded, having experienced Hagrid's cooking at some point in the past.****

**That evening, Dudley paraded around the living room for the family in his brand-new uniform. Smeltings' boys wore maroon tailcoats, orange knickerbockers, and flat straw hats called boaters. **

"Thank Merlin our uniform is black," Alice exclaimed. Everyone nodded.

**They also carried knobbly sticks, used for hitting each other while the teachers weren't looking. This was supposed to be good training for later life.**

**As he looked at Dudley in his new knickerbockers, Uncle Vernon said gruffly that it was the proudest moment of his life. Aunt Petunia burst into tears and said she couldn't believe it was her Ickle Dudleykins, he looked so handsome and grown-up. **

"Evans, your sister is an idiot," Sirius said.

"I think that was established last chapter, starry," James said mockingly.

"Don't call me that," Sirius grumbled. Remus laughed, while everyone else looked confused.

"Starry?" Frank asked, bemused.

"I needed to get him back for 'Jamesie' so it started as 'Siri' but eventually changed to starry since he is named after a constellation," James explained while smirking at his friend.

"Stupid Black family tradition," Sirius grumbled.

"Something wrong, starry?" Lily asked with a grin, annoyed at his earlier dig at her sister, no matter how true it was. After all, his family were just as bad -if not worse- and she never said anything about it. And she knew how much he hated it when Sev winded him up about his family, so what made him think insulting hers was OK?

"Look what you've done," Sirius shouted at James. "You've got Evans doing it now!" He continued grumbling under his breath.

James, however, paid him no attention, as he was too busy staring at Lily dreamily.

**Harry didn't trust himself to speak. He thought two of his ribs might already have cracked from trying not to laugh.**

"Don't blame him," Sirius said dryly, quickly recovering from his annoyance at James.****

**There was a horrible smell in the kitchen the next morning when Harry went in for breakfast. It seemed to be coming from a large metal tub in the sink. He went to have a look. The tub was full of what looked like dirty rags swimming in grey water.**

**"What's this?" he asked Aunt Petunia. Her lips tightened as they always did if he dared to ask a question.**

**"Your new school uniform," she said.**

**Harry looked in the bowl again.**

**"Oh," he said, "I didn't realize it had to be so wet." **

The Gryffindors laughed again.

"I love your son," Sirius told Lily and James.

"Me too," they said simultaneously. This only made Sirius and Remus laugh harder.

"I guess you'll have to make sure he still exists in the changed future then," Sirius said. His tone was innocent but everyone knew what he was implying. James grinned, while Lily's smile slipped from her face. No, she wouldn't. But she had a son with him, she reminded herself. A son she just admitted to loving. But still, she argued back.

Severus felt sick, but was relieved to see Lily looked like she felt much the same way.

**"Don't be stupid," snapped Aunt Petunia. "I'm dyeing some of Dudley's old things grey for you. It'll look just like everyone else's when I've finished." Harry seriously doubted this, but thought it best not to argue. He sat down at the table and tried not to think about how he was going to look on his first day at Stonewall High - like he was wearing bits of old elephant skin, probably.**

"Lovely," Alice said sarcastically. Frank grinned at her. He loved her sarcasm, how had he never noticed it before today?****

**Dudley and Uncle Vernon came in, both with wrinkled noses because of the smell from Harry's new uniform. Uncle Vernon opened his newspaper as usual and Dudley banged his Smelting stick, which he carried everywhere,on the table.**

**They heard the click of the mail slot and flop of letters on the doormat.**

**"Get the mail, Dudley," said Uncle Vernon from behind his paper.**

"Wow, you're actually making your son do something for a change," Molly muttered sarcastically. She was still angry over how terrible the Dursleys parenting was.****

**"Make Harry get it." **

**"Get the mail, Harry." **

"Or not," Arthur corrected his wife sadly.

**"Make Dudley get it." **

**"Poke him with your Smelting stick, Dudley." **

Molly, Lily and James all glared at that, making the people opposite them all feel uncomfortable.

**Harry dodged the Smelting stick and went to get the mail. Three things lay on the doormat: a postcard from Uncle Vernon's sister Marge, who was vacationing on the Isle of Wight, a brown envelope that looked like a bill, and - a letter for Harry.**

"Yes! Hogwarts!" James and Sirius cheered. Lily smiled happily.****

**Harry picked it up and stared at it, his heart twanging like a giant elastic band. No one, ever, in his whole life, had written to him. Who would. He had no friends, no other relatives - he didn't belong to the library, so he'd never even got rude notes asking for books back.**

**Yet here it was, a letter, addressed so plainly there could be no mistake: **

**Mr. H. Potter **

**The Cupboard under the Stairs **

Everyone looked angry at the mention of the cupboard.

**4 Privet Drive **

**Little Whinging **

**Surrey **

**The envelope was thick and heavy, made of yellowish parchment, and the address was written in emerald-green ink. There was no stamp.**

**Turning the envelope over, his hand trembling, Harry saw a purple wax seal bearing a coat of arms; a lion,**

All the Gryffindors, both past and present, cheered or smiled.

** an eagle, a badger, and a snake**

James and Sirius glared at Severus.

** surrounding a large letter H.**

**"Hurry up, boy!" shouted Uncle Vernon from the kitchen. "What are you doing, checking for letter bombs." He chuckled at his own joke.**

"That wasn't funny," Alice said dryly as the Marauders cringed.****

**Harry went back to the kitchen, still staring at his letter. He handed Uncle Vernon the bill and the postcard, sat down, and slowly began to open the yellow envelope.**

"Bad move, Jamesie Jnr.," Sirius said. James and Lily could only nod sadly.****

**Uncle Vernon ripped open the bill, snorted in disgust, and flipped over the postcard.**

**"Marge's ill," he informed Aunt Petunia. "Ate a funny whelk. -." **

**"Dad!" said Dudley suddenly. "Dad, Harry's got something!"**

"Shut it, fattie," James snarled.

** Harry was on the point of unfolding his letter, which was written on the same heavy parchment as the envelope, when it was jerked sharply out of his hand by Uncle Vernon.**

**"That's mine!" said Harry, trying to snatch it back.**

**"Who'd be writing to you?" sneered Uncle Vernon, shaking the letter open with one hand and glancing at it. His face went from red to green faster than a set of traffic lights. And it didn't stop there. Within seconds it was the grayish white of old porridge.**

"Charming," Alice and Molly both said sarcastically. Alice grinned over at the older witch.****

**"P-P-Petunia!" he gasped.**

**Dudley tried to grab the letter to read it, but Uncle Vernon held it high out of his reach. Aunt Petunia took it curiously and read the first line. For a moment it looked as though she might faint. She clutched her throat and made a choking noise.**

"Drama queen," Alice said in a sing-song voice.****

**"Vernon! Oh my goodness - Vernon!" They stared at each other, seeming to have forgotten that Harry and Dudley were still in the room. Dudley wasn't used to being ignored. He gave his father a sharp tap on the head with his Smelting stick.**

**"I want to read that letter," he said loudly. "I want to read it," said Harry furiously, "as it's mine." **

**"Get out, both of you," croaked Uncle Vernon, stuffing the letter back inside its envelope.**

**Harry didn't move.**

**I WANT MY LETTER!" he shouted.**

**"Let me see it!" demanded Dudley.**

**"OUT!" roared Uncle Vernon, and he took both Harry and Dudley by the scruffs of their necks and threw them into the hall, **

James' eyes narrowed once more at this.

**slamming the kitchen door behind them. Harry and Dudley promptly had a furious but silent fight over who would listen at the keyhole; Dudley won, so Harry, his glasses dangling from one ear, lay flat on his stomach to listen at the crack between door and floor.**

**"Vernon," Aunt Petunia was saying in a quivering voice, "look at the address - how could they possibly know where he sleeps. You don't think they're watching the house." **

**"Watching - spying - might be following us," muttered Uncle Vernon wildly.**

"I think we may have better things to do with our time," Sirius said dismissively.****

**"But what should we do, Vernon? Should we write back? Tell them we don't want -" Harry could see Uncle Vernon's shiny black shoes pacing up and down the kitchen.**

**"No," he said finally. "No, we'll ignore it. If they don't get an answer... Yes, that's best... we won't do anything...**

**"But -" **

**"I'm not having one in the house, Petunia! Didn't we swear when we took him in we'd stamp out**

"Stamp out?" Lily repeated dangerously. James was looking murderously, as were his friends and the Weasley matriarch.

** that dangerous nonsense." **

**That evening when he got back from work, Uncle Vernon did something he'd never done before; he visited Harry in his cupboard.**

Everyone frowned at the mention of the cupboard once more. Severus couldn't help but be reminded off his own father, though he was uncomfortable feeling anything akin to sympathy for Potter's spawn. _And Lily's. _This thought did not improve his mood. ****

**"Where's my letter?" said Harry, the moment Uncle Vernon had squeezed through the door. "Who's writing to me?" **

**"No one. it was addressed to you by mistake," said Uncle Vernon shortly.**

"Liar!" James shouted.****

**"I have burned it."**

"Bastard!" Sirius muttered under his breath, careful to make sure neither his Head of House or the intimidating Weasley woman heard him.

**"It was not a mistake," said Harry angrily, "it had my cupboard on it." **

"Why didn't anyone notice that?" Lily asked bitterly.

"The envelopes are self-addressing," McGonagall answered. Lily had forgotten that it was her who wrote the letters.

"Sorry, Professor," she mumbled. "I didn't mean-"

McGonagall gave her one of her rare smile, albeit it sadly. "I assure you Miss. Evans, if I had seen that address I would not ignore it."

**"SILENCE!" yelled Uncle Vernon, and a couple of spiders fell from the ceiling. He took a few deep breaths and then forced his face into a smile, which looked quite painful.**

**"Er - yes, Harry - about this cupboard. Your aunt and I have been thinking... you're really getting a bit big for it... we think it might be nice if you moved into Dudley's second bedroom."**

"Second bedroom?" Lily muttered unbelievingly, angry at her sister once more. James was looking venomous, but one look at Sirius calmed him down. They would have their revenge.

"How could anyone," Molly stuttered, shocked. How could anyone have two children and two bedrooms and make one of them sleep in the cupboard? How could anyone be so cruel to an innocent child?****

**"Why?" said Harry.**

"Don't question it!" Sirius exclaimed.****

**"Don't ask questions!" snapped his uncle.**

"I didn't mean it like that," Sirius said quickly. "I meant he shouldn't question being allowed out of that damned cupboard."

"We know, starry," James told him comfortingly. Sirius' scowl at the nickname was purposefully over-the-top, though he was secretly relieved James wasn't mad.

** "Take this stuff upstairs, now." The Dursleys' house had four bedrooms: **

"FOUR!" This was uttered by several people with Lily and Molly's screams being the loudest.

**one for Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia, one for visitors (usually Uncle Vernon's sister, Marge), one where Dudley slept, and one where Dudley kept all the toys and things that wouldn't fit into his first bedroom.**

"Oh, of course, that's why he needs a second bedroom," Molly muttered sarcastically. Everyone nodded grimly. Molly shook her head sadly at this terrible parenting. One child who had so much stuff it overflowed into an extra room and the other shoved into a cupboard. Once more she stroked her protruding stomach – she would never favour one child over the other.

** It only took Harry one trip upstairs to move everything he owned from the cupboard to this room. He sat down on the bed and stared around him. Nearly everything in here was broken. The month-old video camera was lying on top of a small, working tank**

"Military vehicle. Obviously Dudley's is a toy version," Lily said before Arthur could even ask. He smiled sheepishly while his wife rolled her eyes good-naturedly.

** Dudley had once driven over the next door neighbour's dog; in the corner was Dudley's first-ever television set,**

"I know what that is!" Arthur exclaimed proudly.

** which he'd put his foot through when his favourite program had been cancelled; **

"Horrible brat," Molly murmured.

**there was a large birdcage, which had once held a parrot that Dudley had swapped at school for a real air rifle,**

"Seems a strange trade," Lily murmured. "His parents didn't even mind him giving his pet away from a gun?"

"I don't think his parents mind anything he does," Severus pointed out to his friend. He spoke a lot kindly than if Potter or his idiot friends had said it.

"Miss. Evans were you ever this spoilt?" McGonagall asked her.

"No," Lily replied. "My parents give us presents and stuff obviously but I'd have definitely got in trouble for swapping Brush for a gun."

"Brush?" James asked with a smirk.

"My dog," Lily snapped at him.

"Seriously, Evans, Brush?" Sirius chipped in.

"He has a brush-like tail," she defended.

"Stupid dog," Severus muttered under his breath. The only thing he hated more than Petunia in the Evans household was that damn dog. It growled and attacked him every time he visited Lily. He wondered if Petunia secretly trained it to do so.

"Leave Brush alone," Lily rebuked him. She was fond of her dog – he'd been in her family since she was five.

"Sorry," Severus replied with a smile. He knew Lily was only joking – this was a conversation they'd had many times. She, too, was smiling at the memories.

"But seriously, Evans, Brush?" James called across at her, trying to bring her focus back to him. He hated watching Severus sat there all smug and sharing private jokes with his future wife. _My future wife, _he reminded himself proudly. "I hope you call our pets better names. At least Harry escaped from your naming skills alright."

"Our pets?" Lily said scathingly.

"When we're married," James shot back triumphantly. He couldn't help but smirk at the scowl now gracing Severus' face. _Take that, Snivellus._

Lily had no reply to that. She wanted to argue that she would never end up married to him. But if she never married James, she would never have Harry. She didn't want to change that part of the future. It was making her head ache trying to figure things out. She was trying to ignore the fact that Harry was James' son, too. Though she had noted his concern for the boy as they read with disbelief. Who knew James Potter could care about anyone but himself and causing as many problems as possible?

** which was up on a shelf with the end all bent because Dudley had sat on it. **

"Poor gun," Sirius said, shaking his head in mock-sympathy.

"How'd you know it was gun?" Lily asked.

"You said it was."

"You were listening," Lily replied, shocked.

"It happens occasionally," Remus said with a smirk at his friend. He was getting braver about telling them things.

**Other shelves were full of books. They were the only things in the room that looked as though they'd never been touched.**

Lily, McGonagall and Molly all 'tsk'ed.****

**From downstairs came the sound of Dudley bawling at his mother, "I don't want him in there... I need that room... make him get out..."**

"That kid really is a brat," Sirius said. "I don't always get along with Reg but I don't want him to be miserable." Sirius felt sad as he thought about his brother. Regulus had been sorted into Slytherin like the rest of his family (minus Sirius, of course) earlier in the year and seemed likely to follow his family's beliefs blindly. Sirius wished he could help his little brother but his brother would never listen. It didn't help that Cissy was there in Slytherin– warning him about how his brother was on the road to becoming a blood traitor like her own, and how she was to avoid association with him. Sirius knew Andy leaving had hurt his cousin but that didn't make him like her anymore. She was even worse now she was engaged to the Malfoy scum and due to marry into another bunch of pureblood supremacists the minute she left Hogwarts.

** Harry sighed and stretched out on the bed. Yesterday he'd have given anything to be up here. Today he'd rather be back in his cupboard with that letter than up here without it.**

**Next morning at breakfast, everyone was rather quiet. Dudley was in shock. He'd screamed, whacked his father with his Smelting stick, been sick on purpose, kicked his mother, and thrown his tortoise through the greenhouse roof, and he still didn't have his room back.**

"Good," Molly and Lily grumbled. Lily smiled tentatively at her fellow red-headed witch. She liked the fiery older woman, for she was obviously a caring person. Plus, she could tell by her husband's actions that they were not the sort of wizarding family who were prejudiced against Muggles. It was also reassuring having a woman who was actually a mother responding the same way that she was. Maybe she wouldn't be a terrible mother when she was older.

** Harry was thinking about this time yesterday and bitterly wishing he'd opened the letter in the hall.**

"Same here, son," James muttered dully.

** Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia kept looking at each other darkly.**

**When the mail arrived, Uncle Vernon, who seemed to be trying to be nice to Harry, made Dudley go and get it. **

"Yeah, I'm sure that's the reason," Sirius muttered bitterly.

**They heard him banging things with his Smelting stick all the way down the hall. Then he shouted, "There's another one! 'Mr. H. Potter, The Smallest Bedroom, 4 Privet Drive -'" With a strangled cry, Uncle Vernon leapt from his seat and ran down the hall, Harry right behind him. Uncle Vernon had to wrestle Dudley to the ground to get the letter from him, which was made difficult by the fact that Harry had grabbed Uncle Vernon around the neck from behind.**

"Go Harry!" the marauders cheered. Lily didn't say anything but was glad that her son was fighting back.

** After a minute of confused fighting, in which everyone got hit a lot by the Smelting stick, Uncle Vernon straightened up, gasping for breath, with Harry's letter clutched in his hand.**

**"Go to your cupboard - I mean, your bedroom," he wheezed at Harry.**

**"Dudley - go - just go." **

**Harry walked round and round his new room. Someone knew he had moved out of his cupboard and they seemed to know he hadn't received his first letter. Surely that meant they'd try again. And this time he'd make sure they didn't fail. He had a plan.**

"I sincerely hope it's not like any of his father's," Remus commented seriously. He was finding it easier and easier to wind up and tease his two friends without worrying that they would be angry at him.

"Hey!"

Sirius laughed. "He has a point, Jamesie. Remy comes up with the best plans."

"Really, Lupin?" McGonagall enquired, raising any eyebrow at him.

"Um," the werewolf said anxiously. "Thanks, Sirius," he muttered under his breath.

"See you in detention along side us next time," Sirius whispered back jokingly. Remus scowled at his friend.

**The repaired alarm clock rang at six o'clock the next morning. Harry turned it off quickly and dressed silently. He mustn't wake the Dursleys. He stole downstairs without turning on any of the lights.**

**He was going to wait for the postman on the corner of Privet Drive and get the letters for number four first.**

"That's not too bad a plan," Frank commented. The Marauders, Lily, Alice and the Weasleys all nodded.

**His heart hammered as he crept across the dark hall toward the front door - Harry leapt into the air; he'd trodden on something big and squashy on the doormat - something alive! Lights clicked on upstairs and to his horror Harry realized that the big, squashy something had been his uncle's face.**

The Marauders laughed. "Serves him right!" Sirius cheered.

**Uncle Vernon had been lying at the foot of the front door in a sleeping bag, clearly making sure that Harry didn't do exactly what he'd been trying to do. He shouted at Harry for about half an hour and then told him to go and make a cup of tea. Harry shuffled miserably off into the kitchen and by the time he got back, the mail had arrived, right into Uncle Vernon's lap.**

**Harry could see three letters addressed in green ink.**

**I want -" he began, but Uncle Vernon was tearing the letters into pieces before his eyes. Uncle Vernon didn't go to work that day. He stayed at home and nailed up the mail slot.**

**"See," he explained to Aunt Petunia through a mouthful of nails, "if they can't deliver them they'll just give up."**

**"I'm not sure that'll work, Vernon." **

**"Oh, these people's minds work in strange ways, Petunia, they're not like you and me," said Uncle Vernon, **

"What does he know?" Severus said sarcastically. "At least Tuney has some knowledge of the wizarding world, albeit it unwillingly."

**trying to knock in a nail with the piece of fruitcake Aunt Petunia had just brought him.**

"Somebody's going slightly mad," Alice sang gleefully, a smirk on her face. Her smirk was repeated on each of the Marauder's faces.

**On Friday, no less than twelve letters arrived for Harry. As they couldn't go through the mail slot they had been pushed under the door, slotted through the sides, and a few even forced through the small window in the downstairs bathroom.**

**Uncle Vernon stayed at home again. After burning all the letters, he got out a hammer and nails and boarded up the cracks around the front and back doors so no one could go out. He hummed "Tiptoe Through the Tulips" as he worked, and jumped at small noises.**

"Really, really mad," Alice continued in the same voice.

**On Saturday, things began to get out of hand. Twenty-four letters to Harry found their way into the house, rolled up and hidden inside each of the two dozen eggs that their very confused milkman had handed Aunt Petunia through the living room window.**

Lily, Severus, and Arthur laughed at that image.

"What's a milkman?" James asked.

"Someone who delivers milk to Muggle houses," Arthur told him, proud to know the answer.

"Don't they have shops?"

"Please, continue reading Mr. Lupin," Molly cut in before her husband could answer.

**While Uncle Vernon made furious telephone calls to the post office and the dairy trying to find someone to complain to, Aunt Petunia shredded the letters in her food processor.**

**"Who on earth wants to talk to you this badly?" Dudley asked Harry in amazement.**

"Hogwarts!" the Marauders cheered.

**On Sunday morning, Uncle Vernon sat down at the breakfast table looking tired and rather ill, but happy.**

**"No post on Sundays," he reminded them cheerfully as he spread marmalade on his newspapers, "no damn letters today -"**

"Only in the Muggle world, "Lily corrected with a grin.

**Something came whizzing down the kitchen chimney as he spoke and caught him sharply on the back of the head. Next moment, thirty or forty letters came pelting out of the fireplace like bullets. The Dursleys ducked, but Harry leapt into the air trying to catch one.**

"Go Harry!" all the Gryffindors cheered.

**"Out! OUT!" Uncle Vernon seized Harry around the waist and threw him into the hall.**

**When Aunt Petunia and Dudley had run out with their arms over their faces, Uncle Vernon slammed the door shut. They could hear the letters still streaming into the room, bouncing off the walls and floor.**

**"That does it," said Uncle Vernon, trying to speak calmly but pulling great tufts out of his moustache at the same time. I want you all back here in five minutes ready to leave. We're going away. Just pack some clothes. No arguments!" He looked so dangerous with half his moustache missing that no one dared argue.**

"Calm down, half-moustache face," Sirius said sweetly. All the Gryffindors and the Weasleys snorted. Arthur looked at his wife surprised.

"I have a sense of humour, you know," she muttered angrily.

**Ten minutes later they had wrenched their way through the boarded-up doors and were in the car, speeding toward the highway.**

**Dudley was sniffling in the back seat; his father had hit him round the head for holding them up while he tried to pack his television, VCR, and computer in his sports bag.**

**They drove. And they drove. Even Aunt Petunia didn't dare ask where they were going. Every now and then Uncle Vernon would take a sharp turn and drive in the opposite direction for a while. "Shake'em off... shake 'em off," he would mutter whenever he did this.**

**They didn't stop to eat or drink all day. By nightfall Dudley was howling. He'd never had such a bad day in his life. He was hungry, he'd missed five television programs he'd wanted to see, and he'd never gone so long without blowing up an alien on his computer.**

"Aww, diddums, "Lily said sarcastically. "Now you know how my son feels," she added venomously.

**Uncle Vernon stopped at last outside a gloomy-looking hotel on the outskirts of a big city. Dudley and Harry shared a room with twin beds and damp, musty sheets. Dudley snored but Harry stayed awake, sitting on the windowsill, staring down at the lights of passing cars and wondering...**

**They ate stale cornflakes and cold tinned tomatoes on toast for breakfast the next day. They had just finished when the owner of the hotel came over to their table.**

**"'Scuse me, but is one of you Mr. H. Potter. Only I got about an 'undred of these at the front desk." She held up a letter so they could read the green ink address:**

**Mr. H. Potter**

**Room 17 **

**Railview Hotel **

**Cokeworth **

**Harry made a grab for the letter but Uncle Vernon knocked his hand out of the way. The woman stared.**

**"I'll take them," said Uncle Vernon, standing up quickly and following her from the dining room.**

"She shouldn't let him do that," Lily said. "Tampering with someone else's mail is illegal."

**"Wouldn't it be better just to go home, dear?" Aunt Petunia suggested timidly, hours later, but Uncle Vernon didn't seem to hear her. Exactly what he was looking for, none of them knew. He drove them into the middle of a forest, got out, looked around, shook his head, got back in the car, and off they went again. The same thing happened in the middle of a ploughed field, halfway across a suspension bridge, and at the top of a multilevel parking garage.**

**"Daddy's gone mad, hasn't he?" Dudley asked Aunt Petunia dully late that afternoon.**

"Yep!" Alice sang.

**Uncle Vernon had parked at the coast, locked them all inside the car, and disappeared.**

**It started to rain. Great drops beat on the roof of the car. Dudley snivelled.**

**"It's Monday," he told his mother. "The Great Humberto's on tonight. I want to stay somewhere with a television. " Monday. This reminded Harry of something. If it was Monday - and you could usually count on Dudley to know the days the week, because of television - then tomorrow, Tuesday, was Harry's eleventh birthday. Of course, his birthdays were never exactly fun - last year, the Dursleys had given him a coat hanger and a pair of Uncle Vernon's old socks.**

"What?" James shouted. He began muttering insults under his breath - Remus and Sirius who could hear him smirked at some of the more creative ones.

**Still, you weren't eleven every day.**

**Uncle Vernon was back and he was smiling. He was also carrying a long, thin package and didn't answer Aunt Petunia when she asked what he'd bought.**

**"Found the perfect place!" he said. "Come on! Everyone out!" It was very cold outside the car. Uncle Vernon was pointing at what looked like a large rock way out at sea. Perched on top of the rock was the most miserable little shack you could imagine. One thing was certain, there was no television in there.**

**"Storm forecast for tonight!" said Uncle Vernon gleefully, clapping his hands together. "And this gentleman's kindly agreed to lend us his boat!" A toothless old man came ambling up to them, pointing, with a rather wicked grin, at an old rowboat bobbing in the iron-grey water below them.**

**"I've already got us some rations," said Uncle Vernon, "so all aboard!" It was freezing in the boat. Icy sea spray and rain crept down their necks and a chilly wind whipped their faces. After what seemed like hours they reached the rock, where Uncle Vernon, slipping and sliding, led the way to the broken-down house.**

**The inside was horrible; it smelled strongly of seaweed, the wind whistled through the gaps in the wooden walls, and the fireplace was damp and empty. There were only two rooms.**

**Uncle Vernon's rations turned out to be a bag of chips each and four bananas.**

"That's not rations!" Molly exclaimed.

**He tried to start a fire but the empty chip bags just smoked and shrivelled up.**

**"Could do with some of those letters now, eh?" he said cheerfully.**

"Bastard," James grumbled too low for either McGonagall or Molly to hear him. (It didn't know which witch scared him more.)

**He was in a very good mood. Obviously he thought nobody stood a chance of reaching them here in a storm to deliver mail. Harry privately agreed, though the thought didn't cheer him up at all.**

**As night fell, the promised storm blew up around them. Spray from the high waves splattered the walls of the hut and a fierce wind rattled the filthy windows. Aunt Petunia found a few mouldy blankets in the second room and made up a bed for Dudley on the moth-eaten sofa. She and Uncle Vernon went off to the lumpy bed next door, and Harry was left to find the softest bit of floor he could and to curl up under the thinnest, most ragged blanket.**

Everyone scowled at that. Lily and James looked ready to murder someone again.

**The storm raged more and more ferociously as the night went on. Harry couldn't sleep. He shivered and turned over, trying to get comfortable, his stomach rumbling with hunger. Dudley's snores were drowned by the low rolls of thunder that started near midnight. The lighted dial of Dudley's watch, which was dangling over the edge of the sofa on his fat wrist, told Harry he'd be eleven in ten minutes' time. He lay and watched his birthday tick nearer, wondering if the Dursleys would remember at all, wondering where the letter writer was now.**

**Five minutes to go. Harry heard something creak outside. He hoped the roof wasn't going to fall in, although he might be warmer if it did.**

Several people snorted at this thought.

**Four minutes to go. Maybe the house in Privet Drive would be so full of letters when they got back that he'd be able to steal one somehow.**

"Yeah!" James and Sirius cheered.

**Three minutes to go. Was that the sea, slapping hard on the rock like that. And (two minutes to go) what was that funny crunching noise. Was the rock crumbling into the sea.**

**One minute to go and he'd be eleven. Thirty seconds... twenty ... ten... ****nine - maybe he'd wake Dudley up, just to annoy him**

"DO IT!" the Gryffindors all cheered.

**three... two... ****one... ****BOOM.**

Remus shouted the last word, earning a smack from James who was next to him.

**The whole shack shivered and Harry sat bolt upright, staring at the door. Someone was outside, knocking to come in.**

"Who?" several voices shouted as Remus stopped reading.

"That's the end of the chapter," he said. James grabbed the book of him eagerly.


	5. The Keeper Of The Keys

**CHAPTER FOUR.**

**THE KEEPER OF THE KEYS.**

"Hagrid," the Marauders cheered. James smiled knowing Hagrid would take good care of his son.

**BOOM.**

James shouted the word.

"Whose idea was it to give him this chapter?" Lily muttered sarcastically. Molly and McGonagall nodded in agreement.

**They knocked again. **

**Dudley jerked awake. "Where's the cannon?" he said stupidly.**

"Can he say things any other way?" Alice quipped.

**There was a crash behind them and Uncle Vernon came skidding into the room. He was holding a rifle in his hands - now they knew what had been in the long, thin package he had brought with them.**

"He has a gun in front of my son!" Lily exclaimed.

"What exactly is a gun?" Molly asked cautiously, having already guessed by the Muggleborn's reaction that it was dangerous.

"A Muggle weapon. They use them to kill."

"Like a Muggle version of the killing curse," Arthur muttered softly. He knew that they was a dark side to Muggle innovation just as much as there was a dark side to magic.

**"Who's there?" he shouted. "I warn you - I'm armed!"**

"Why is he saying he has arms?" Sirius asked, genuinely confused.

"Muggle also call guns firearms," Arthur explained.

**There was a pause. Then - SMASH!**

Everyone winced at James' shout, even louder than before. He smirked happily.

**The door was hit with such force that it swung clean off its hinges and with a deafening crash landed flat on the floor.**

**A giant of a man was standing in the doorway. His face was almost completely hidden by a long, shaggy mane of hair and a wild, tangled beard, but you could make out his eyes, glinting like black beetles under all the hair.**

**The giant squeezed his way into the hut, stooping so that his head just brushed the ceiling. He bent down, picked up the door, and fitted it easily back into its frame. The noise of the storm outside dropped a little. He turned to look at them all.**

**"Couldn't make us a cup o' tea, could yeh. It's not been an easy journey..."**

"Hagrid," Dumbledore sighed affectionately.

**He strode over to the sofa where Dudley sat frozen with fear.**

**"Budge up, yeh great lump," said the stranger.**

"Go Hagrid," all the Gryffindors cheered, even Lily mumbled it under her breath

**Dudley squeaked and ran to hide behind his mother,**

"I doubt that'll work," Alice sang.

**who was crouching, terrified, behind Uncle Vernon.**

**"An' here's Harry!" said the giant.**

**Harry looked up into the fierce, wild, shadowy face and saw that the beetle eyes were crinkled in a smile.**

**"Las' time I saw you, you was only a baby," said the giant. "Yeh look a lot like yet dad, but yeh've got yet mom's eyes."**

Lily and James both smiled imagining their son.

**Uncle Vernon made a funny rasping noise. "I demand that you leave at once, sir!" he said. "You are breaking and entering!"**

**"Ah, shut up, Dursley, yeh great prune," said the giant; he reached over the back of the sofa, jerked the gun out of Uncle Vernon's hands, bent it into a knot as easily as if it had been made of rubber, and threw it into a corner of the room.**

"Thank God," Lily sighed. At the same time, Molly said "Thank Merlin."

**Uncle Vernon made another funny noise, like a mouse being trodden on.**

**"Anyway - Harry," said the giant, turning his back on the Dursleys, "a very happy birthday to yeh. Got summat fer yeh here - I mighta sat on it at some point, but it'll taste all right." From an inside pocket of his black overcoat he pulled a slightly squashed box. Harry opened it with trembling fingers. Inside was a large, sticky chocolate cake with Happy Birthday Harry written on it in green icing.**

"When we get out of here I'm thanking Hagrid," Lily announced, relieved to hear about someone finally being nice to her son.

**Harry looked up at the giant. He meant to say thank you, but the words got lost on the way to his mouth, and what he said instead was, "Who are you?"**

"Potter, my son has your manners," Lily growled.

James laughed. "Our son," he corrected.

**The giant chuckled.**

**"True, I haven't introduced meself. Rubeus Hagrid, Keeper of Keys and Grounds at Hogwarts." He held out an enormous hand and shook Harry's whole arm.**

**"What about that tea then, eh?" he said, rubbing his hands together "I'd not say no ter summat stronger if yeh've got it, mind."**

The Marauders rolled their eyes. "Hagrid and his drink," Remus sighed.

"You really should talk to him, Albus," McGonagall said sternly.

**His eyes fell on the empty grate with the shrivelled chip bags in it and he snorted. He bent down over the fireplace; they couldn't see what he was doing but when he drew back a second later, there was a roaring fire there. It filled the whole damp hut with flickering light and Harry felt the warmth wash over him as though he'd sunk into a hot bath.**

**The giant sat back down on the sofa, which sagged under his weight, and began taking all sorts of things out of the pockets of his coat: a copper kettle, a squashy package of sausages, a poker, a teapot, several chipped mugs, and a bottle of some amber liquid that he took a swig from before starting to make tea.**

"Is there anything Hagrid doesn't have in his pockets?" Frank asked, bemused.

"Nope," Alice replied merrily, popping the 'p'. Frank smiled at her.

**Soon the hut was full of the sound and smell of sizzling sausage. Nobody said a thing while the giant was working, but as he slid the first six fat, juicy, slightly burnt sausages from the poker, Dudley fidgeted a little. Uncle Vernon said sharply, "Don't touch anything he gives you, Dudley." **

**The giant chuckled darkly. "Yeh great puddin' of a son don' need fattenin' anymore, Dursley, don' worry."**

"Agreed," Lily said harshly.

**He passed the sausages to Harry, who was so hungry he had never tasted anything so wonderful, but he still couldn't take his eyes off the giant. Finally, as nobody seemed about to explain anything, he said, "I'm sorry, but I still don't really know who you are." The giant took a gulp of tea and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.**

**"Call me Hagrid," he said, "everyone does. An' like I told yeh, I'm Keeper of Keys at Hogwarts - yeh'll know all about Hogwarts, o' course."**

"No because his Aunt is a bitch," Sirius growled.

"Bitch," little Bill shouted from where he was playing at his parents' feet. He was not paying much attention to what was happening around him – every time he got bored a new toy appeared for him to play with.

Molly turned her most ferocious glare on him but it was Arthur who spoke.

"This is why Molly asked you not to swear," he admonished mildly. He picked his son up onto his lap and proceeded to tell him that it was a naughty word.

"Sorry," Sirius mumbled. 

**"Er - no," said Harry.**

All the Gryffindors looked like they wanted to say something but refrained as nobody was certain they could keep their language clean.

**Hagrid looked shocked.**

**"Sorry," Harry said quickly.**

"It's not you who should be apologising," Lily said fiercely. 

**"Sorry?" barked Hagrid, turning to stare at the Dursleys, who shrank back into the shadows. "It' s them as should be sorry! I knew yeh weren't gettin' yer letters but I never thought yeh wouldn't even know abou' Hogwarts, fer cryin' out loud! Did yeh never wonder where yet parents learned it all."**

**All what?" asked Harry.**

**"ALL WHAT?" Hagrid thundered.**

James smirked some more – he really did get the good chapter.

"Stop shouting," Molly shouted.

"You just sho-" James cut off when Sirius kicked him in the leg.

"You know the Prewetts, right?" he mumbled under his breath. "And their very famous temper?"

**"Now wait jus' one second!" He had leapt to his feet. In his anger he seemed to fill the whole hut.**

**The Dursleys were cowering against the wall.**

**"Do you mean ter tell me," he growled at the Dursleys, "that this boy - this boy! - knows nothin' abou' - about ANYTHING."**

"Not very well worded," Frank commented.

**Harry thought this was going a bit far. He had been to school, after all, and his marks weren't bad.**

**"I know some things," he said. "I can, you know, do math and stuff." **

**But Hagrid simply waved his hand and said, "About our world, I mean. Your world. My world. Yer parents' world." **

**"What world?" Hagrid looked as if he was about to explode.**

"DURSLEY!"

"You do that one more time," Molly grumbled.

"And what?" James taunted.

"I still have my wand," Molly reminded him threateningly.

"Miss. Prewett," McGonagall scolded. The twenty-something woman blushed at being scolded as though she was back in school.

"Weasley," she corrected, causing Arthur to smile.

**he boomed.**

**Uncle Vernon, who had gone very pale, whispered something that sounded like "Mimblewimble."**

"Isn't that a plant?" Alice asked.

"Mimbulus Mimbletonia," Frank told her. "I enjoy Herbology," he shrugged.

**Hagrid stared wildly at Harry.**

**"But yeh must know about yet mom and dad," he said. "I mean, they're famous. You're famous."**

**"What? My - my mom and dad weren't famous, were they?" **

"Only for dying," Lily muttered sadly.

**"Yeh don' know... yeh don' know..." Hagrid ran his fingers through his hair, fixing Harry with a bewildered stare.**

**"Yeh don' know what yeh are?" he said finally.**

**Uncle Vernon suddenly found his voice.**

**"Stop!" he commanded. "Stop right there, sit! I forbid you to tell the boy anything!"**

"Like that'll work," Sirius scoffed.

**A braver man than Vernon Dursley would have quailed under the furious look Hagrid now gave him; when Hagrid spoke, his every syllable trembled with rage.**

**"You never told him. Never told him what was in the letter Dumbledore left fer him.**

McGonagall and Lily looked angry at the mention of the letter.

**I was there! I saw Dumbledore leave it, Dursley! An' you've kept it from him all these years." **

**"Kept what from me?" said Harry eagerly.**

**"STOP! I FORBID YOU!" yelled Uncle Vernon in panic.**

**Aunt Petunia gave a gasp of horror.**

**"Ah, go boil yet heads, both of yeh," said Hagrid. "Harry - yet a wizard." **

"What a way to tell him, Hagrid," James chuckled. Everyone else in the room laughed, except Severus. He noticed Lily laughing beside him with distaste.

**There was silence inside the hut. Only the sea and the whistling wind could be heard.**

**"- a what?" gasped Harry.**

**"A wizard, o' course," said Hagrid, sitting back down on the sofa, which groaned and sank even lower, "an' a thumpin' good'un, I'd say, once yeh've been trained up a bit. With a mum an' dad like yours, what else would yeh be.**

"Thanks, Hagrid," James said, smiling.

**An' I reckon it's abou' time yeh read yer letter." Harry stretched out his hand at last to take the yellowish envelope, addressed in emerald green to Mr. H. Potter, The Floor, Hut-on-the-Rock, The Sea. He pulled out the letter and read: **

**HOGWARTS SCHOOL of WITCHCRAFT and WIZARDRY **

**Headmaster: ALBUS DUMBLEDORE (Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorc., Chf. Warlock, Supreme Mugwump, International Confed. of Wizards) **

**Dear Mr. Potter, **

**We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment.**

**Term begins on September 1. We await your owl by no later than July 31.**

**Yours sincerely, **

**Minerva McGonagall, **

**Deputy Headmistress**

"Hasn't changed much," James said.

"It was the same when we started, "Arthur commented.

"Aside from who it was from, it was the same when I started," Dumbledore added. Everyone in the room tried to imagine that then – Dumbledore at Hogwarts as a student not a teacher.

**Questions exploded inside Harry's head like fireworks and he couldn't decide which to ask first. After a few minutes he stammered, "What does it mean, they await my owl?"**

Lily laughed slightly. "I didn't even think about that till after McGonagall had gone. Of course, with Muggleborns we don't have to send a reply, we simply tell whoever visits us."

**"Gallopin' Gorgons, that reminds me," said Hagrid, clapping a hand to his forehead with enough force to knock over a cart horse, and from yet another pocket inside his overcoat he pulled an owl - a real, live, rather ruffled-looking owl - a long quill, and a roll of parchment.**

"Told ya," Alice said smugly to Frank. "There's nothing Hagrid doesn't have in those pockets."

"How long till those two get together?" Molly whispered to her husband. "I'd say it'll happen before we finish these books."

"I agree, dear. And what about those two?" He nodded towards Lily and James.

"The same. They are reading about their son."

**With his tongue between his teeth he scribbled a note that Harry could read upside down:**

**Dear Professor Dumbledore, **

**Given Harry his letter. Taking him to buy his things tomorrow.**

**Weather's horrible. Hope you're well.**

**Hagrid**

**Hagrid rolled up the note, gave it to the owl, which clamped it in its beak, went to the door, and threw the owl out into the storm. Then he came back and sat down as though this was as normal as talking on the telephone.**

**Harry realized his mouth was open and closed it quickly.**

**"Where was I?" said Hagrid, but at that moment, Uncle Vernon, still ashen-faced but looking very angry, moved into the firelight.**

**"He's not going," he said.**

"He's still trying?" Frank asked, shaking his head.

"Haven't we established he's an idiot?" Sirius said harshly.

**Hagrid grunted.**

**"I'd like ter see a great Muggle like you stop him," he said.**

**"A what?" said Harry, interested.**

**"A Muggle," said Hagrid, "it's what we call nonmagic folk like thern. An' it's your bad luck you grew up in a family o' the biggest Muggles I ever laid eyes on."**

**"We swore when we took him in we'd put a stop to that rubbish," said Uncle Vernon, "swore we'd stamp it out of him!**

"Stamp it out," Lily hissed again. James was slightly scared by the glare she sent the book, though no less annoyed than she was.

Dumbledore looked down sadly, thinking of his sister. Those Muggle boys had tried to stamp out Ariana's magic.

**Wizard indeed!" **

**"You knew?" said Harry. "You knew I'm a - a wizard." **

**"Knew!" shrieked Aunt Petunia suddenly. "Knew! Of course we knew! How could you not be, my dratted sister being what she was.**

Lily looked down sadly.

"She's just jealous," Severus said, patting her arm comfortingly. James watched on jealously.

"We really need to start making up our plan to get Petunia back," he muttered to Sirius and Remus. They needed to come up with something big – something that would impress Lily.

**Oh, she got a letter just like that and disappeared off to that-that school-and came home every vacation with her pockets full of frog spawn, turning teacups into rats.**

"But that's underage magic," Frank pointed out.

Lily blushed. "I just wanted to show them. I got a warning from the Ministry."

"Perfect Lily got a warning from the ministry!" Sirius exclaimed. Lily scowled at him.

**I was the only one who saw her for what she was - a freak! **

Lily remembered her sister's harsh words when she first left for Hogwarts. All those years later and Tuney still hadn't changed. And made her son suffer for her prejudices.

"If you're a freak, Miss. Evans, then so is everyone else in this room," Molly said softly, spotting the younger witch's misery.

Lily smiled weakly at her. "Thanks, Mrs. Weasley."

**But for my mother and father, oh no, it was Lily this and Lily that, they were proud of having a witch in the family!"**

"As they should be," James said angrily.

**She stopped to draw a deep breath and then went ranting on. It seemed she had been wanting to say all this for years.**

**"Then she met that Potter at school and they left and got married and had you, and of course I knew you'd be just the same, just as strange, just as - as - abnormal - and then, if you please, she went and got herself blown up and we got landed with you!"**

Lily started to cry, no longer able to help herself. Of all the ways she could have told her son about her death, that was how she did it. How could her own sister be so cruel?

"We're going to change this," James told her across the table. "We'll raise Harry not Petunia and Vernon." Lily smiled softly at this idea. She forgot to even be disgusted by the idea of being married to James.

Severus watched this exchange silently. He had intended to comfort Lily but now the Potter boy had beat him to it. And Lily didn't even seem bothered by the idea of raising a child with him. Would she really follow through with the idea of marrying Potter? All for his spawn? He had to make her see that she had other options – she could marry someone else and still have a child.

"That's how she tells him?" Molly said incredulously to her husband. "She is an evil bitch."

"Bitch, Bitch," Bill shouted from his father's lap.

"Molly," Arthur admonished while trying not to laugh. "That's a bad word," he reminded his son sternly.

"Mama said. Mama said."

"Mama shouldn't have said it," Molly told him softly, her cheeks flaming red.

Sirius, meanwhile, was grinning over at the red-headed witch. He opened his mouth to say something, ignoring Arthur who was shaking his head at him.

"Now who's teaching your son bad words?"

"Please continue reading, Mr. Potter," McGonagall ordered. Molly smiled gratefully at her.

**Harry had gone very white. As soon as he found his voice he said, "Blown up. You told me they died in a car crash!" **

**"CAR CRASH!" roared Hagrid,**

"POTTER!" McGonagall shouted.

"Why does everyone keep shouting at me for shouting?" he muttered.

"I am not shouting at a volume so loud it hurts everyone's eardrums."

Though several of her students would liked to have disagreed, none of them were stupid enough to actually do so.

**jumping up so angrily that the Dursleys scuttled back to their corner. "How could a car crash kill Lily an' James Potter. It's an outrage! A scandal! Harry Potter not knowin' his own story when every kid in our world knows his name!" **

**"But why? What happened?" Harry asked urgently.**

**The anger faded from Hagrid's face. He looked suddenly anxious.**

**"I never expected this," he said, in a low, worried voice. "I had no idea, when Dumbledore told me there might be trouble gettin' hold of yeh, how much yeh didn't know. Ah, Harry, I don' know if I'm the right person ter tell yeh - but someone's gotta - yeh can't go off ter Hogwarts not knowin'." He threw a dirty look at the Dursleys.**

"Imagine that," Remus said thoughtfully. "If he really is as famous as Hagrid says. He'd be so confused."

**"Well, it's best yeh know as much as I can tell yeh - mind, I can't tell yeh everythin', it's a great myst'ry, parts of it..." He sat down, stared into the fire for a few seconds, and then said, "It begins, I suppose, with - with a person called - but it's incredible yeh don't know his name, everyone in our world knows -"**

**"Who?"**

**"Well - I don' like sayin' the name if I can help it. No one does." **

**"Why not?" **

**"Gulpin' gargoyles, Harry, people are still scared. Blimey, this is difficult. See, there was this wizard who went... bad. As bad as you could go. Worse. Worse than worse. **

"I don't think that quite covers it," James muttered angrily.

**His name was..." Hagrid gulped, but no words came out.**

**"Could you write it down?" Harry suggested.**

**"Nah -can't spell it. All right –**

James steeled all his Gryffindor courage.

**Voldemort." **

Everyone but Dumbledore and Lily flinched. Lily had said the name during the first chapter and was beginning to understand what her headmaster had said. It was just a name, after all.

"It's not so bad once you say it, is it?" Lily asked James with understanding in her voice.

He shook his head. "No." He was determined to stop calling Voldemort 'You-Know-Who' from now on. If Lily could say it, he could.

**Hagrid shuddered. "Don' make me say it again. Anyway, this - this wizard, about twenty years ago now, started lookin' fer followers. Got 'em, too - some were afraid, some just wanted a bit o' his power, 'cause he was gettin' himself power, all right. Dark days, Harry. Didn't know who ter trust, didn't dare get friendly with strange wizards or witches... terrible things happened. He was takin' over. 'Course, some stood up to him - an' he killed 'em. Horribly. One o' the only safe places left was Hogwarts. Reckon Dumbledore's the only one You-Know-Who was afraid of. Didn't dare try takin' the school, not jus' then, anyway.**

**"Now, yer mum an' dad were as good a witch an' wizard as I ever knew. Head boy an' girl**

"I get Head Girl," Lily exclaimed proudly.

"Well done," Molly said with a smile.

Sirius and Remus, meanwhile, were goggling at James.

"Who in the right mind would make James Head Boy?" Sirius shouted.

"I suppose many people would say I wasn't in my right mind, Mr. Black," Dumbledore commented serenely. He wondered if he had been match-making.

**at Hogwarts in their day! Suppose the myst'ry is why You-Know-Who never tried to get 'em on his side before... probably knew they were too close ter Dumbledore ter want anythin' ter do with the Dark Side.**

"I'd never join the Dark Side," James proclaimed hotly.

"Me neither," Lily agreed.

**"Maybe he thought he could persuade 'em... maybe he just wanted 'em outta the way. All anyone knows is, he turned up in the village where you was all living, on Halloween ten years ago. You was just a year old.**

**He came ter yer house an' - an' -" Hagrid suddenly pulled out a very dirty, spotted handkerchief and blew his nose with a sound like a foghorn.**

**"Sorry," he said. "But it's that sad - knew yer mum an' dad, an' nicer people yeh couldn't find - anyway..."**

James and Lily smiled sadly at their friend's compliment.

**"You-Know-Who killed 'em. An' then - an' this is the real myst'ry of the thing - he tried to kill you, too. Wanted ter make a clean job of it, I suppose, or maybe he just liked killin' by then. But he couldn't do it. **

"But why?" Lily muttered. She looked in her headmaster's direction.

"I do not know, Miss. Evans. We shall have to read on and see if we learn more."

**Never wondered how you got that mark on yer forehead. That was no ordinary cut. That's what yeh get when a powerful, evil curse touches yeh - took care of yer mum an' dad an' yer house, even - but it didn't work on you, an' that's why yer famous, Harry. No one ever lived after he decided ter kill 'em, no one except you, an' he'd killed some o' the best witches an' wizards of the age – **

James stopped reading then as he saw the next line.

"Who dies, James?" Sirius asked him. He read over his friends shoulder. "Oh," was all he said.

**the McKinnons,**

"Marlene!" Lily cried. Marlene was her dorm mate and her closest friend at Hogwarts after Severus.

All the other Gryffindors looked sad, including their Head of House. Molly and Arthur bowed their heads in respect even though they didn't know her.

**the Bones, **

"Edgar and Amelia!" Molly gasped. Arthur stroked her arm comfortingly, while trying to hide his own grief. Edgar had been in their year at Hogwarts. He was a Hufflepuff so they hadn't known him well, but they remembered him for Herbology and he had been a friendly boy.

The current students all thought of Amelia Bones. She was the current Head Girl and even the Marauders liked her. They knew that if she caught them she would at least be fair.

Dumbledore sighed. How many of his students would be killed in this war?

James threw a glance at Molly, who was already upset, before reading the next line.

**the Prewetts**

"What?" Molly gasped. She shook her head. frantically "No, no, it can't be. My parents. Fabian and Gideon. All, all gone?" She covered her mouth with her hand and began to cry heavily. Arthur pulled her closer and she buried her head into his shoulder, while he searched for the right words to comfort her. He finally choose what had already been said so many times during the reading.

"We can change this."

Molly lifted her head up and nodded slightly. She wiped her tears away shakily. Then she gasped. "You don't, you don't think I'm-" She looked at her son, who was watching her with a confused expression. Would him and his brother have to grow up in a world without their mother?

"I imagine if they meant you as well Hagrid would also have said the Weasleys," Dumbledore explained calmly.

Molly relaxed slightly but she was still struggling to comprehend the idea that her family was dead.

**an' you was only a baby, an' you lived." Something very painful was going on in Harry's mind. As Hagrid's story came to a close, he saw again the blinding flash of green light, more clearly than he had ever remembered it before - and he remembered something else, for the first time in his life: a high, cold, cruel laugh.**

Everyone in the room shivered at the thought.

**Hagrid was watching him sadly.**

**"Took yeh from the ruined house myself, on Dumbledore's orders. Brought yeh ter this lot..."**

"Wish he hadn't," James muttered. He refrained himself from glaring at the Headmaster.

**"Load of old tosh," said Uncle Vernon.**

"He's still trying?" Frank exclaimed incredulously.

"Have we not established he's an idiot?" Alice commented dryly.

**Harry jumped; he had almost forgotten that the Dursleys were there. Uncle Vernon certainly seemed to have got back his courage.**

"What courage?" James spat angrily.

**He was glaring at Hagrid and his fists were clenched.**

**"Now, you listen here, boy," he snarled, "I accept there's something strange about you, probably nothing a good beating wouldn't have cured**

"He better not have," Lily hissed.

**and as for all this about your parents, well, they were weirdos,**

"They were not!" Remus shouted forcefully, surprising everyone. He was usually the most mild-mannered of the Marauders.

**no denying it, and the world's better off without them in my opinion**

"It most certainly is not," Sirius said forcefully.

**asked for all they got, getting mixed up with these wizarding types - just what I expected, always knew they'd come to a sticky end -"**

The book received many glares but no more was said – Lily and James had surely got the point by now.

**But at that moment, Hagrid leapt from the sofa and drew a battered pink umbrella from inside his coat. Pointing this at Uncle Vernon like a sword, he said, "I'm warning you, Dursley -I'm warning you - one more word... " In danger of being speared on the end of an umbrella by a bearded giant, Uncle Vernon's courage failed again; he flattened himself against the wall and fell silent.**

**"That's better," said Hagrid, breathing heavily and sitting back down on the sofa, which this time sagged right down to the floor. Harry, meanwhile, still had questions to ask, hundreds of them.**

**"But what happened to Vol-, sorry - I mean, You-Know-Who."**

Dumbledore sighed. Hagrid had managed to impress the fear of the name onto him.

**"Good question, Harry. Disappeared. Vanished. **

"How could he disappear?" Frank asked.

"I have many theories, Mr. Longbottom, but I think-"

"It's best to continue to read and found out," Frank finished, parroting the same answer Dumbledore had given to similar questions earlier.

**Same night he tried ter kill you. Makes yeh even more famous. That's the biggest myst'ry, see...he was gettin' more an' more powerful - why'd he go.**

**"Some say he died. Codswallop, in my opinion. Dunno if he had enough human left in him to die.**

Dumbledore sighed again. If one of his theories was right then Hagrid was more correct about that then he would ever know.

**Some say he's still out there, bidin' his time, like, but I don' believe it. People who was on his side came back ter ours. Some of 'em came outta kinda trances. Don~ reckon they could've done if he was comin' back.**

**"Most of us reckon he's still out there somewhere but lost his powers. Too weak to carry on. 'Cause somethin' about you finished him, Harry.**

**There was somethin' goin' on that night he hadn't counted on - I dunno what it was, no one does - but somethin' about you stumped him, all right." Hagrid looked at Harry with warmth and respect blazing in his eyes, but Harry, instead of feeling pleased and proud, felt quite sure there had been a horrible mistake. A wizard. Him. How could he possibly be. He'd spent his life being clouted by Dudley, and bullied by Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon; if he was really a wizard, why hadn't they been turned into warty toads every time they'd tried to lock him in his cupboard.**

"Doesn't work like that," James said. "Though I wish it did."

**If he'd once defeated the greatest sorcerer in the world, how come Dudley had always been able to kick him around like a football.**

"Hagrid," he said quietly, "I think you must have made a mistake. I don't think I can be a wizard." To his surprise, Hagrid chuckled.

"Not a wizard, eh. Never made things happen when you was scared or angry."

"Yep!" Sirius shouted, thinking of the vanishing glass.

**Harry looked into the fire. Now he came to think about it... every odd thing that had ever made his aunt and uncle furious with him had happened when he, Harry, had been upset or angry... chased by Dudley's gang, he had somehow found himself out of their reach... dreading going to school with that ridiculous haircut, he'd managed to make it grow back... and the very last time Dudley had hit him, hadn't he got his revenge, without even realizing he was doing it. Hadn't he set a boa constrictor on him.**

"Yep!" Sirius shouted again.

**Harry looked back at Hagrid, smiling, and saw that Hagrid was positively beaming at him.**

**"See." said Hagrid. "Harry Potter, not a wizard - you wait, you'll be right famous at Hogwarts."**

**But Uncle Vernon wasn't going to give in without a fight.**

"Just wow," Frank murmured sarcastically.

**"Haven't I told you he's not going?" he hissed. "He's going to Stonewall High and he'll be grateful for it. I've read those letters and he needs all sorts of rubbish - spell books and wands and -"**

**"If he wants ter go, a great Muggle like you won't stop him," growled Hagrid. "Stop Lily an' James Potter' s son goin' ter Hogwarts! Yer mad. His name's been down ever since he was born. He's off ter the finest school of witchcraft and wizardry in the world. Seven years there and he won't know himself. He'll be with youngsters of his own sort, fer a change, an' he'll be under the greatest headmaster Hogwarts ever had Albus Dumbled-" **

**"I AM NOT PAYING FOR SOME CRACKPOT OLD FOOL TO TEACH HIM MAGIC TRICKS!"**

Sirius laughed while everyone else scowled at James once more. "He shouldn't have said that!" he sang happily.

**yelled Uncle Vernon.**

**But he had finally gone too far. Hagrid seized his umbrella and whirled it over his head, "NEVER," he thundered,**

"POTTER!" McGonagall roared.

"Is there not some spell to stop him, Professor?" Lily asked sweetly.

"Not without silencing him completely."

"Not such a bad idea," Molly mumbled.

James only smirked as he continued.

**"- INSULT- ALBUS-**

Suddenly, James' mouth was opening and closing but no sound was coming out. He turned to glare at his Head of House.

"Don't look at me that way, Mr. Potter."

He next turned to Lily.

"Wasn't me," she protested.

"Or me," Molly said before he could even look at her.

James crossed his arms and huffed.

"I'll read then," Sirius exclaimed, smirking.

**DUMBLEDORE- IN- **

Sirius' shouts were just as loud as his friend's and he found himself silenced as well. Molly lent over and took the book of him.

**FRONT- OF- ME!"**

Molly finished the sentence in a loud but acceptable tone.

**He brought the umbrella swishing down through the air to point at Dudley - there was a flash of violet light, a sound like a firecracker, a sharp squeal, and the next second, Dudley was dancing on the spot with his hands clasped over his fat bottom, howling in pain. When he turned his back on them, Harry saw a curly pig's tail poking through a hole in his trousers.**

All the current students and the Weasleys burst out laughing, James and Sirius albeit silently.

"He deserves it," Alice said angrily. Frank looked at her alarmed by this change of tone but didn't question her. It was true.

**Uncle Vernon roared. Pulling Aunt Petunia and Dudley into the other room, he cast one last terrified look at Hagrid and slammed the door behind them.**

"I really hope that's the last we hear about them," Remus muttered.

**Hagrid looked down at his umbrella and stroked his beard. "Shouldn'ta lost me temper," he said ruefully, "but it didn't work anyway. Meant ter turn him into a pig, but I suppose he was so much like a pig anyway there wasn't much left ter do."**

"Ain't that the truth," Frank muttered.

**He cast a sideways look at Harry under his bushy eyebrows.**

**"Be grateful if yeh didn't mention that ter anyone at Hogwarts," he said. "I'm - er - not supposed ter do magic, strictly speakin'. I was allowed ter do a bit ter follow yeh an' get yer letters to yeh an' stuff - one o' the reasons I was so keen ter take on the job**

**"Why aren't you supposed to do magic?" asked Harry.**

**"Oh, well - I was at Hogwarts meself but I - er - got expelled, ter tell yeh the truth.**

"Why?" Lily questioned.

Remus shrugged. "We asked but he always changes subject."

**In me third year. They snapped me wand in half an' everything. But Dumbledore let me stay on as gamekeeper. Great man, Dumbledore." **

**"Why were you expelled?" **

**"It's gettin' late and we've got lots ter do tomorrow," said Hagrid loudly.**

"Like that," Remus said with a slight smile.

**"Gotta get up ter town, get all yer books an' that." He took off his thick black coat and threw it to Harry.**

**"You can kip under that," he said. "Don' mind if it wriggles a bit, I think I still got a couple o' dormice in one o' the pockets."**

Alice looked at Frank pointedly.

"He probably even has the kitchen sink in there," Lily murmured. Severus laughed. James scowled, unable to draw her attention to him due to the silencing charm.

"That's the end of the chapter," Molly announced.

"I believe it's Black's turn to read, if he can keep his voice to a sensible level," McGonagall said sternly. Sirius nodded, doing his best to look innocent, and she performed the counter-curse.

James waved at his Transfiguration Professor wildly. Reluctantly, she performed the counter-curse on him, too. He immediately turned to Lily.

"Evans, why would Hagrid carry around a sink?" he asked incredulously.

"It's a Muggle saying, Potter," she replied coldly. "To have everything but the kitchen sink."

"It makes no sense," he insisted. She scowled at him.

"It was nice while it lasted," Arthur muttered to his wife while rubbing his forehead as if he had a headache.

"Sneaky spell-casting," she muttered back.

"No one ever suspects the quiet one."


End file.
